Finding Sakura
by Michiru's Mirror
Summary: There's something wrong with Sakura... Centered around Team Seven, though everybody shows up.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the story itself.

Warnings: This is a VERY DARK FIC overall, and this chapter includes some rather violent sex. I trust everyone here is responsible enough to know if they can handle that or not. This story takes place right after the latest story arc.

Finding Sakura  
Chapter One

By Michiru's Mirror

* * *

It wasn't that Sakura was acting particularly different than usual. When Naruto made a joke, she would giggle. When Kakashi scolded her for acting willful, she would hang her head and nod along before doing whatever she wanted to anyway. When Sai would draw a picture she would go out of her way to compliment it and try to coax a few words out of the silent _shinobi_.

It wasn't that she looked any different either. Her pink hair was still bouncy and perfectly groomed, her training clothes kept immaculate. The smile on her face was as radiant as ever, her skin as smooth as before. To all appearances Sakura was the same sickeningly cheerful girl she'd always been.

Still, though Kakashi did not know what it was, something was wrong. He did not know how he knew, since Sakura was acting exactly as she always did. But whenever he looked at his former student he knew down to his very bones that something was amiss, so much so that it was hurting her on a level deeper than he could see with his eyes. It was just little things. Sometimes he would show her a new maneuver only to find that she hadn't taken in a single word he'd said. Occasionally she'd be doing something as simple as tree climbing and mess it up. Other times he would glance at her when she thought he wasn't looking and notice an expression of such raw sadness in her eyes that the Copy Ninja found himself uncharacteristically wanting to go and give her a hug. Or a puppy. Or a vacation. _Anything_ to get that look off of her face. But then the look would be gone so quickly Kakashi would start to wonder if he'd imagined it

If he weren't an unusually intelligent man, and if he didn't know Sakura as well as he did, Kakashi wouldn't have noticed the signs. But he was, and he did, and he had to do something about it.

He started by asking Naruto and Sai if they knew anything. This was a mistake. Naruto, who had noticed nothing, immediately got worried enough at the mere suggestion that his Sakura-chan was having a problem that Kakashi had to restrain the blond from running to her side to pester her with questions. If Sakura was trying to hide the fact that she had a problem from her teammates, cornering and harassing her was not going to help.

Sai had a less dramatic reaction but was still no help at all: he knew nothing.

Kakashi's next act (along with his new sidekick, Naruto) was to pay his _Hokage_ a visit in her office and ask if she had noticed anything. She allowed Naruto to ramble on a moment while she thought ("Well? Have you noticed anything? Anything at all? 'Cause I really haven't, and I think that's strange 'cause it's _me_ and _Sakura-chan_ and how is it that _I_ wouldn't notice? I notice everything. Once, we were out doing this training in the woods—we being me and Sakura-chan and Sai—and Sai painted this cheetah running towards us and it had this one back claw missing, and guess who noticed it? Me! Well actually Sakura-chan noticed and pointed it out, but then I saw it really quickly.") before leaning forward from behind her desk. Naruto fell silent immediately and pressed his lips together tightly as he bounced on the balls of his feet. This was important.

"Her chakra levels are low," Tsunade said.

Kakashi did not look up from his inspection of the _Icha Icha Special Guide_ he'd found peeking out from underneath a dozen healing _jutsu_ scrolls. His _Hokage_, a hidden pervert. There was hope for her yet. "She's been working really hard, so that's normal isn't it?"

"No it isn't," said Tsunade flatly. "It's not that her chakra is low at the end of the day after she's been working really hard, it's that it's low when she comes into work. That means she's doing something during the night that's draining her chakra."

Naruto pondered what a person might be doing at night to drain their energy levels and said, "maybe she's training."

"Maybe," said Tsunade, "but I doubt it. She works really hard, but Sakura isn't the type to murder herself with training the way you are."

"Besides," said Kakashi, "why would Sakura try to hide that she's training?"

"Maybe 'cause she's ashamed of being. You know. Weaker." Said Naruto.

"Tactful as always." Tsunade rolled her eyes. "But Sakura is always very vocal about the hard work she's putting into training _because_ she's so ashamed of being…um…not quite as full of energy as you. If she were doing extra exercises to pull herself up she'd probably make absolutely sure we knew about it."

"Well if she's not training, then what the hell is she doing?"

"I have no idea," said Tsunade, "and frankly I don't think it's our business as long as it's not interfering with her work. Her chakra levels have been a bit low, but it's hardly anything dangerous. Maybe she's got a sick friend she's been healing."

"_Hokage-sama_, I wish I could believe that," said Kakashi hesitantly. He was now tapping the _Icha Icha_ book absentmindedly as he stared out the filthy window at Tsunade's back. "Believe me, I don't make a habit out of butting into my teammates lives."

Naruto thought of Kakashi tying Sasuke to a tree to try and talk the Uchiha out of revenge and rolled his eyes.

"But all my instincts are telling me this is really serious. I've got no proof, but something is wrong with that girl, and it's not just going to get better by itself." Kakashi was looking his _Hokage_ directly in the eyes now, trying to convey that he wasn't joking.

Tsunade looked back for a moment, leaving Naruto to stare from one to the other, wishing he was perceptive enough to understand the communication between them. It was the woman who broke eye contact finally, perhaps because she so disliked what she said next. "I believe you. And…I agree. I've felt it too. Sometimes when she thinks I'm not looking at her, her face just…" Tsunade trailed off. She had no word to describe the look of intense pain she saw on her student's face.

"But the fact remains that Sakura's private life is her private life," the _Hokage_ continued, straightening up and schooling her features into a stern expression. "Until she asks for help, there isn't much we can do, is there?"

Naruto gaped at Tsunade, unable to believe what he was hearing. As far as he was concerned, there was no problem that was unsolvable with some meddling by loved ones. "But, but Sakura-chan is in trouble! We left Sasuke alone and look what happened to him!"

"No," said Tsunade, "you butted into Sasuke's affairs constantly and gave him more advice than he ever wanted and he still chose to go his own way. People make their own decisions, Naruto, and you can't always change their minds!"

Naruto opened his mouth to speak again, but Tsunade raised a hand for silence. "Now I'm not denying the problem. I fully encourage both of you to keep an eye on her, and if Sakura goes to you for help you have my full support in doing whatever you think will help." Tsunade's expression softened. "I trust you to act in her best interests, after all. But until Sakura speaks up we have to respect her privacy. I'm not going to order her to spill her guts, and if I find either of you have done anything to force her to reveal things she doesn't want to I'll decorate my office with your small intestines.

"Got it?" Tsunade's friendly smile did nothing to make the threat less potent.

Recently Konoha had been enjoying some of the most beautiful weather it had seen in years. Despite it being March, the sun was shining brightly and the temperature was warm enough that one could easily go around without a jacket.

Most of the village was taking advantage. If a person were to go to Konoha Central Park, for example, that person's attention would be immediately drawn to Inuzuka Kiba and Hyuuga Hinata, who were on dog sitting duty. The Inuzuka matriarch, Tsume, had been called to a meeting of clan heads only to be told that the head of the Hyuuga household was horribly allergic to dogs. After several arguments that resulted in pulled hair, thrown pens, three tantrums and six spilled drinks the Aburame clan patriarch resolved the dispute by threatening to permanently infest both clan's households with fleas if they didn't come to an agreement.

Thus, Tsume's dog Kuromaru had been left in Kiba's care, and Hinata had been instructed to help. Kuromaru had taken a great liking to Hinata and was acting like a puppy again, chasing the Hyuuga heir around in circles. Kiba was allowing this because he had yet to realize that Hinata was terrified of dogs.

If a person were to go to Konoha Public Library on the other hand, they would find the inside of the building mostly deserted. The lone occupant was Aburame Shino. He found that staying inside had the double advantage of keeping his pale skin out of the sun and keeping himself away from dog duty. Though the bug-wielder had come to love his teammates more than he'd ever thought possible, he still couldn't quite make his bugs love Kiba's dogs.

Naruto almost went to Konoha Central Park and Konoha Public Library because he was considering asking the members of Team Eight if they had noticed anything odd about Sakura lately (they were, after all, the team most specialized in tracking and would notice clues and hints that others could easily miss), but he eventually decided against it. Team Eight were friends Naruto would trust with his life, but they weren't family. If Kakashi wasn't just being paranoid and Sakura did have some kind of really serious problem, it might well be a private matter that she didn't want just anybody finding out about.

So Naruto went to Nakamura's Yakiniku restaurant instead, because Team Ten was there.

Almost two months ago Chouji and Shikamaru's exasperation at Ino's refusal to eat had grown into outright alarm when the blonde fainted during training one day. They had tried cajoling her, ordering her, outright threatening her, and cooking her favorite foods but nothing seemed to break Ino's iron will to turn herself into a living skeleton. After two weeks Shikamaru had figured out Ino's weakness and exploited it: her pride. At least twice a week Chouji and Shikamaru would casually ask Ino to a team luncheon, where they would dare her to try and out-eat one of them. Bristling at the very idea that she couldn't do something they could, Ino would accept. They had been doing this for a month and a half and Ino had yet to catch on that she was being tricked into saving her own life. Shikamaru was constantly grumbling about what a pain in the ass it was to spend so much money in restaurants, but Chouji coyly noticed that it wasn't such a pain in the ass that his friend wasn't willing to do it. He agreed it was hard on his wallet, though, with Asuma-sensei no longer around to pay. As of next week the two were going to try to get her to go to one of their houses instead.

Naruto entered by ducking under the gaudy purple curtain that covered the doorway and easily spotted the trio sitting in a corner of the restaurant. Chouji had grabbed a piece of meat at the same time as Ino, resulting in a tug-of-war that was inadvertently splashing a less than amused Shikamaru with flecks of beef. Chouji stopped to apologize to his friend, only to find the beef pulled from his chopsticks by a triumphant Ino.

"Ha ha ha-ha ha!" She cried, popping the beef in her mouth and choking on it. Naruto stepped up and thumped her on the back until she was able to breathe again.

"Thanks," she wheezed as Shikamaru put a hand to his face in total disgust.

"No problem!" Said Naruto, plopping himself down next to Ino uninvited. _Act cool_, he thought to himself, _just act cool…nothing's wrong here…_ "So! How are you guys? How's life? How's training? How's the food?"

"Oh, it's—"

"Great, great," Naruto babbled, cutting Chouji off. "That's great. Wonderful. I mean, we're—I mean, I'M great, just great."

"Um," said Shikamaru. "That's great."

"Yeah. Yeah, isn't it? And not just me, nope! No, Kakashi-sensei is great. Hell, he's fabulous. New porno book coming out in less than a month, it doesn't get much better than that for him. And Sai is having all kinds of fun, he's getting along better with all of us every day! And Sakura-chan, well she's always great. I mean, doesn't she seem great? Like always? She does look great to you, doesn't she?"

Here Naruto paused from his monologue to see three shocked faces. "Have you been drinking?" Asked Ino seriously.

Shikamaru, much more perceptive than his teammate, narrowed his eyes and asked, "Is something wrong with Sakura, then?"

At the look of alarm on Ino's face Naruto quickly shook his head. "No! Nope, not a bit, she's—"

"—'Great,' we know," Ino snapped. "What's wrong with my friend?"

Naruto decided to go with a half-truth before she throttled him. "Well, it's nothing serious. It's just that…well, Tsunade-baachan noticed her—Sakura-chan's, not Tsunade-baachan's—chakra levels have been a little low lately. I was just wondering what she was using all that chakra on, like if she was training extra with you guys or something." Whatever the _Hokage_ had said, Naruto was sure that if anyone was going to spend extra energy on anything, it had to involve training.

Shikamaru's narrowed eyes showed he didn't believe a word of it, but Ino and Chouji both relaxed. "Oh, is that all," said Ino. "Well she hasn't been doing anything with us, but why don't you ask Sai?"

Naruto blinked in surprise. "Sai?"

"Yeah," Chouji agreed. "She's been going by his place, like, every night. We see her every time we walk home from dinner."

"Yeah, and whenever I go to meet her after her shifts in the hospital she's been going over there lately too." Said Ino, scowling jealously. "She says she goes over there to help him with an art project."

Naruto left Team Ten squabbling over the check, happy to avoid further questioning from Shikamaru. With any luck, Shikamaru's naturally lazy disposition would keep the genius from following up on his suspicions. After all, taking care of Ino's anorexia was probably enough responsibility.

Naruto took his time walking down the street as he mulled over just how odd the whole situation was. Sai had said just that morning that he hadn't noticed anything wrong with Sakura. Was he lying? Or were he and Sakura doing something together that they didn't want others to know about? No way, no frickin' way—if Sakura was oddly nice to Sai sometimes, it was just because it was in her nature to try and make peace with everyone. Naruto absolutely refused to believe that anything more was going on. He'd prove it, too—he'd go to Sai's apartment that very night and see for himself that there was nothing to see!

Naruto wished he were smarter, smart enough to figure out for himself what was really going on (because it surely wasn't anything that might make him jealous, oh no). He wished Kakashi hadn't been scared off by their _Hokage's_ threats, either—the Copy Ninja would be able to figure this mess out. But Naruto wasn't smart enough, and Kakashi wasn't there, so Naruto figured he'd just have to go and see for himself.

Sai had recently moved into an apartment about halfway between Naruto's own apartment and the Haruno household. Given that Sai was now a member of Team Seven for an as yet undetermined period of time, he and Kakashi had decided that it made sense for him to be easy for his teammates to get a hold of. The place was tiny, but Sai never seemed to mind. As long as he had space to store his art supplies and enough room to lie down at night, he was satisfied.

Naruto at first planned to knock on the front door, but as he got closer to the apartment he began to change his mind. Not that he had any conscious problem with the idea of knocking on the door and just asking Sai what was going on. Instead there was a feeling in his gut, a nervous twisty feeling that made the blond walk more and more slowly the closer to Sai's apartment he got.

_Well…it couldn't hurt to just take a peek in the window,_ Naruto thought._ Just to see if anyone's home before I bother with the door…_

Naruto leapt from the streets to the rooftops a good block away from Sai's apartment complex, and traversed the distance in a few prodigious hops. When he was on the roof of a boutique across from his teammate's apartment complex, Naruto jumped into a huge tree that looked directly into Sai's window. He had to struggle for a moment with the mass amount of leaves that seemed to have sprouted overnight (stupid unusually warm March weather!). Finally he managed to push them all out of the way enough for him to get a perfect view of Sakura spread naked on Sai's bed.

Naruto almost fell out of the tree.

When he had recovered himself, Naruto rubbed his eyes with the backs of his hands, hard. He couldn't have seen that. He didn't just see that.

But he had. Naruto looked again and there Sakura was, lying on her back with her hands held above her head (and just out of Naruto's field of vision). Though she was completely naked, the medic was covered in ink pictures: phoenixes, tigers and dragons were drawn across her pale flesh, making her skin seem alive with movement. Naruto couldn't see her face, as it was turned away from the window, but he could easily manage a look of bliss on the features he adored so much. Sakura was a living work of art. Naruto knew he would have thought so even without the ink drawings.

When Sai walked up to her as naked as she, Naruto began to feel sick to his stomach. This was really happening. Sakura was really letting _Sai_ of all people…letting him…

Naruto straightened on the tree branch and prepared to leap away. He didn't want to watch this, and even if he did it really wasn't his right to do so. Feeling more depressed than he had since Sasuke's betrayal Naruto prepared to jump away, but felt one last masochistic urge to look back.

When he gave in and looked, sadness turned again to shock in the blink of an eye, for Sai was kneeling down onto Sakura with a kunai in his hand. Horrified, Naruto stood frozen while Sai sunk the kunai into the tiger running over Sakura's left breast. Sakura threw her head back and Naruto saw that she was biting her lip, her forehead scrunched up in pain and tears leaking from her eyes.

Sai carved the tiger out with quick, efficient strokes. His face never changed from its calm and masklike appearance, but Naruto saw the other boy's erection growing harder as more of Sakura's blood spilled over her sides. Sai moved from the tiger on Sakura's breast to the phoenix spread majestically across her belly. Sakura's red blood filled in the phoenix image until the beast appeared alive on her skin, the mythical fiery creature about to burst out of the prison of Sakura's flesh and come to life.

Sakura was tossing her head from side to side now and biting her lip so hard it was bleeding too. Naruto felt his knees shake and he almost collapsed from the feelings of disgust coursing through his body. Sai was apparently feeling fairly strong emotions too; he was saying something to Sakura, and then he was turning her onto her belly and shoving her head into the mattress and her rear into the air.

And then, oh God, then he was _fucking_ her, pushing his cock in and out of Sakura so roughly that the girl's head was shoved deeply into the mattress with every thrust. She was screaming, Naruto knew she was by the way her head was twisting wildly even though her face never came up from the mattress. Sai was holding her head down—he was suffocating her!

Naruto gasped and forced himself to straighten up. He had seen a lot of horrors in his life, but nothing he'd ever heard of could compare to this.

_Sakura-chan is in trouble, damn it! Go! Go!_

He went. Not bothering to wonder about the circumstances or how dangerous it was for him to leap through a pane of glass, Naruto went crashing through Sai's window boots first and made sure the bottoms of his feet hit Sai right in the shoulders.

Sai went flying, and the crunch he made as he collided with the far wall was satisfying enough to make up for all the cuts smarting across Naruto's body. The blonde took a look back at Sakura and was horrified all over again. Blood was smeared all over his dear friend's body, and now that he could see her arms Naruto realized they were tied much too tightly to the headboard. In turning her over, Sai had twisted Sakura's wrists in those ropes, making them weep with blood and pus. Tears fell from the girl's wide eyes, and she was trying in vain to pull her body into as small a ball as possible.

Trembling with rage, Naruto took a single second to slash Sakura's wrists free with the blood-soaked kunai Sai had dropped before leaping across the room. Naruto could feel the _kyuubi _boiling inside of him, felt his eyes go slitted and red as claws and fangs grew from his body. Let the change come. He was going to tear Sai apart, going to rip his arms off and throw them out the window, going to drink his blood and eat his entrails!

In the time Naruto had taken to untie Sakura Sai had picked up his brush. Naruto found himself facing a soaring eagle. He didn't pause, but batted the creature out of the air and continued across the room.

But suddenly Sakura was in front of him, her tear and snot streaked face right in his own, yelling something Naruto couldn't hear past the roaring in his ears. There was enough left of him to halt; he growled deep in his chest, warning her to get out of his way so he could kill who he had to.

"Naruto!" She was crying, and he heard her. "Naruto, please, don't do this! Stop it, it's not Sai, it's not his fault—_I asked him to do this_!"

A punch to his gut couldn't have destroyed Naruto's concentration more completely than that last sentence.

"You…you…Sakura-chan, you what?" Naruto's eyes went wide, and the red bled from them like the blood from Sakura's wounds.

"Please…Naruto…" She was sobbing now, her chest heaving as she reached for him. Naruto stepped back, repulsed and shocked.

"You…Sakura-chan how? You couldn't…"

"She did," said Sai flatly, coming to stand beside Sakura. As usual, he looked as calm as if the three of them were discussing a vaguely interesting book Sakura had just read. "She's been coming to me for weeks, and it's been her idea all the way."

Naruto felt his head begin to spin, felt bile rise in his throat. "I'm gonna be sick."

"No," Sakura moaned, her arms trembling and her face desperate. "Don't…it's not…"

"It's not what, Sakura-chan, not what it looks like?" Naruto shook his head and then put his hand to his mouth to prevent himself from vomiting. "You and he have been…" Naruto trailed off again, unable to finish the thought. "I don't want to know this," he finally said, not looking at either of his teammates. "This is sick…this is disgusting and I don't want to know about it!"

The _kyuubi_ container turned and almost stumbled back towards the window, the cuts on his skin healing as he went. He knew the wounds in his soul would take much longer.

He left so quickly he didn't see Sakura collapse to the floor, wracked with sobs.

TO BE CONTINUED

* * *

A/N

A while ago I read this little one-shot piece called "Living Canvas" by Monday's Dusk Noon. I loved it, and wrote to the author asking if I could use her idea of Sai painting on and cutting up Sakura (provided that I not plagiarize, of course). She agreed. God bless you, MDN! Go read the story, the plot is totally different from this one and it's really cool.

If you liked this piece, or if you didn't like it, please review and tell me why, I'd love to hear any opinions, corrections or criticisms!


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Naruto is, in fact, mine. And I invented the toothpick, too.

Warnings: Sex, though not as graphic as the last chapter.

Finding Sakura

By Michiru's Mirror

Chapter Two

Her shirt was inside out, her skirt was on backwards and she had forgotten her bra in Sai's apartment, but Haruno Sakura did not notice. Her brain was far, far away, too distant to feel even the tears streaking her face.

_This is sick_, Naruto had said to her. _This is disgusting_. Only in Sakura's mind and memory the words had been twisted until cries of _you're sick, Sakura-chan, you're disgusting_ rang through her head over and over again. Unbearable, those words. Intolerable. They threatened to burst open her skull.

She had sat shaking on Sai's floor after Naruto had left, unable to move or do anything but cry for several moments. Sai, who had read in a book that hot beverages were soothing, went to the kitchen to make tea; unfortunately Sakura misunderstood the gesture. Her mind twisted Sai's action from one of friendship to one of cold indifference, just as it had twisted Naruto's words. With another sob she had leapt up, grabbed her clothing, and ran out the door. Sai did not follow.

And so here she was now, wandering the streets of Konoha in a daze of self-loathing and pain. God, she should just put herself out of everyone's misery.

She had tried so hard, trained so long, and it still wasn't enough, was it? It would never be enough. She had promised herself that she would be strong, strong enough to protect her boys, and here she was as pathetic as ever.

She could hear all of their voices telling her so. She had always had the voices in the back of her head jeering at her, but lately it had been hard to hear anything else. She tried and she tried and she was just falling further behind, becoming more and more useless with each passing month. She was protected and pushed out of the way, a burden to be born. Everyone, _everyone_ had told her so with words or eyes: originally it was Sasuke, who sneered at her weakness; then Kakashi, who had paid his most useless student so little attention; Yamato, who had tried to comfort her by telling her the strength of her feelings was more important than the strength of her body when he kept her from fighting

Only Naruto had been separate. On nights when she lay crying and wanting to give up, she always remembered that at least he believed in her. He had inspired her with his own determination to succeed, and comforted her with his simple lack of harsh words for her mistakes and flaws.

_You're sick, Sakura-chan! You're disgusting!_

Now, even he had come to see just how pitiful she was. If Naruto could see it, then it had to be true.

Sakura came to her house and tried to turn the doorknob three times before her fogged brain registered that it was locked. She hoped she had her key. The cuts Sai made had partly clotted, but blood was still soaking into her shirt in copious enough amounts that it would soon show even through red cloth in the dark.

She could heal herself, of course, but there was something childishly satisfying about bleeding while nobody noticed. Only a flimsy few millimeters of cloth blocked her body from discovery, and something about that was exciting and funny. Sakura realized she was giggling as she opened the front door and stepped inside.

Her life was ruined now, Sakura reflected as she walked into the bathroom. She did not panic as she thought this, because she was in so much emotional pain that her mind was filtering out any other negative emotions as a defense. Naruto would tell everybody, and they would find her disgusting as well and shun her. Tsunade certainly didn't need perverted masochistic weirdoes on her staff, and this would be the final straw for Kakashi-sensei as well. She was already useless, but weird too? This went way beyond his _Icha Icha_ fetish.

Sakura stepped into the shower and did not feel how freezing the water was as it cascaded over her and irritated her partly-healed cuts. She healed herself after awhile, though, because there was no reason not to—she wasn't tempting fate inside her own home, and anyway there was no fate left to tempt with her secret as good as out.

She got into bed and was asleep in an instant. The sheer weight of her emotions, some she was aware of and some she wasn't yet, exhausted her.

* * *

_Sakura was walking down the hallway of Konoha Hospital, and for the first time in living memory it was empty. The unnaturally clean walls were the same as always, and trays of sterilized tools and wheelchairs and blankets lay around as though they had recently been used—as though people had been here a moment ago, but disappeared at Sakura's approach. Even at night when visiting hours were over patients lay in their beds and the night staff could always be found at their desks, and this was broad daylight. Where did everyone go?_

_But there! There, just at the corner was a trace of spiky black hair that she knew so well, that she'd dreamed about every night of her life. "Sasuke-kun!" She cried. "Wait!" But he did not wait. Instead the hair disappeared from her sight and when Sakura herself ducked around the corner there was no sign that anyone had been there at all._

_Sakura jumped as she heard a rustling sound from the patient room to her left, like someone shifting under thin sheets. A patient, perhaps? Curious, Sakura turned to read the name plate on the door: Hatake Kakashi._

"_Kakashi-sensei!" Sakura gasped. She threw the door open joyfully, only to find the room empty and the far window wide open. She rushed over, concerned that her teacher had fallen, and looked out into a bright and sunny meadow. There was Kakashi-sensei with Naruto and Sasuke by his side, back to thirteen years old just as they had been before Sasuke had deserted them. Crying out, Sakura tried to jump outside only to find the window had closed itself again. She tried to open it, and then to bang on the window to catch the attention of the males outside. They did not hear her._

_Sakura was back in the hallway again, and did not remember how she'd gotten there. She looked around, green eyes taking in the spotless hallway and half-open, empty patient rooms. It was as though this hallway had no ending, as though it was impossible for her to find a way out._

_The medic heard a sound from behind her and turned, coming face to face with Uzumaki Naruto. He was sixteen again, dressed in a strange mix of his own pants and Sasuke's old shirt. And had his eyes always been black? Weren't they blue?_

_Whatever. "Naruto!" She said. "I can't find a way out of here!"_

_Naruto shrugged. "I know the way out," he said. _

"_Thank God. Show me!"_

_He looked genuinely confused. "Why would I do that? You're disgusting."_

_Sakura blinked and he was gone. Her face was wet; the jade-eyed girl reached up and found tears streaking her face, undeniable and unstoppable. Her heart hurt, she realized, hurt so badly that she couldn't stay on her feet; she crumpled into a gasping heap on the ground. And ah, there before her was a nice, sharp scalpel. All she had to do was use it, run it over her wrists or neck and then the pain would be gone forever and ever, no more disgusting, useless Sakura…_

_There were feet standing before her. Startled, Sakura dropped the scalpel that she had just picked up and looked up to see a woman she did not know. The woman was lovely; sex appeal had left her long ago, but she had a radiant smile and beautiful gray-streaked golden hair that framed her face perfectly. Kind blue eyes looked down at Sakura with no judgment. "You poor dear!" Said the woman. She knelt down and opened her arms, and Sakura fell into them without hesitation and bawled for what felt like hours, letting her pain leak out of her._

"_Now then," said the woman, "you just cry all you want to, and then you tell your Auntie all about it."_

_Auntie? Sakura didn't have an aunt—both of her parents were only children. But somehow the title felt good and right when applied to the woman who held her, and so Sakura nodded and sniffled and said, "Auntie."_

_The story spilled out of her in a rush, but Auntie didn't seem to need help understanding. The older woman held Sakura in a strong yet gentle embrace, radiating comfort and understanding. Auntie didn't blink as Sakura talked about being useless, didn't cringe when Sakura told her about the recent need she'd had to punish herself in increasingly vile ways, didn't make a sound when Sakura talked about how something inside of her seemed to make people want to leave her._

"_Well, my dear," said Auntie gently after Sakura's tirade had faded into soft sniffles, "if your friends are leaving you behind because you're not strong enough, then the only thing to do is find a way to become stronger."_

"_I've tried!" Sakura sniffled. "For almost three years I've worked so hard, but I'm still the one who gets pushed out of the way!"_

"_If you've come to the limits of what you can do by yourself, then there's no shame in asking for help," said Auntie gently. "After all, Naruto wouldn't be so powerful if he didn't have a demon inside of him to boost his chakra and heal his wounds, now would he? Would Kakashi have mastered all the _jutsu_ he has if he hadn't been given the _sharingan_?"_

_Sakura was distraught enough that she didn't question how Auntie knew about the _kyuubi or the sharingan.

"_Well…that's true. But how can I get the help I need?"_

_Auntie smiled down at Sakura. "Darling, your Auntie can help you there."_

* * *

Sai took his time walking to the training field the next day. He was confused, he was worried, and both feelings were alien to him. Blocks of stone streets and wood houses passed by him unseen as Sai turned the previous night's events over in his head.

He didn't understand what had happened; neither sex nor friendship were topics that Sai had any experience with. He had come to rely on Sakura above any other to explain such things to him; it was she who had explained the connection between Naruto and Sasuke, she who had shown an interest in his past with his brother and tried to help him piece his memories together. When she had come to him asking for sex he had seen no reason to refuse. Was she not a person he could trust to teach him new things, a person who had his best interests at heart?

And what on earth had made Naruto so angry? Naruto had sometimes shown irritation when Sakura had invited Sai along to events Naruto didn't wait the other to be part of, or when Sai said something against proper etiquette, but for the most part the blond had been as good and loyal a friend as Sakura herself. Sai had begun to trust the other man, and was…_hurt_ that Naruto had suddenly lashed out at him with what appeared to be killing intent.

The blond man's upset obviously had something to do with Sai's coital relationship with Sakura. But what could it be when the relationship was consensual?

It was less than two months ago that the sex began. Sai had been moving into his new apartment, and Sakura had offered to help him. They were hanging up his many pictures when Sai had heard Sakura gasp.

"This phoenix is amazing!" She had cried, stretching the picture out in front of her face and devouring it with her gaze. "It's just ink and paper, but you've put such life into it. I feel like it's going to fly right off the page!"

Sai shook his head. "I don't like that one. The beak is off and the tail is too long."

"Really?" Sakura seemed genuinely shocked that he could think so. "But the long tail makes it look so graceful!"

Sai shook his head again. "I've been promising myself for weeks that I'd do that one over. But…somehow it seems like a daunting project."

Sakura smiled. "It makes you nervous to try again?"

Sai wasn't sure how to answer, so he said nothing. Truthfully, he _was_ nervous. He had a routine when he painted: first he'd see an image in his head, and second he'd pull out his brush and paper and record the image. Simple. He only very rarely painted something that didn't come out perfectly, and on the occasions that he did he would simply throw the failed picture away. Yet the phoenix was special, somehow. As Sakura had said, there was life in it, a feeling he couldn't explain. For almost the first time here was an image that he couldn't picture in his head with perfect clarity, an image that came from something deep inside of him that he couldn't explain or even fully understand. What part of his psyche was this image attached to? What memories, what feelings would it shake loose if he pursued the frightening option of painting without a set image in his head? And what if he couldn't paint it perfectly? What if he was damned to try and create the image again and again, only to never have it come out right?

"Come on," said Sakura, startling Sai out of his thoughts. "Try to paint it again! Right now."

Sai shook his head. "I have no fresh canvases unpacked yet."

Sai understood now that the way Sakura had taken her shirt and chest bindings off to proffer him her back was a clear message of her desire—understood it because she had explained this after they had had sex. At the time, he took it at face value when she turned away from him and said, "Paint here, then."

The phoenix he painted with broad strokes across her back was still not right somehow.

"Try again," she said, and even Sai heard the strange lilt to her voice as she turned and bared her breasts to him.

He did. It was still wrong.

"Again," she whispered.

He filled her flesh with phoenixes, creatures of fire swooping across her belly and arms and legs, and then her nether regions when all the rest of her had been covered. She was panting by then, wiggling her hips so that his brush went off course and his drawings were ruined—but somehow the swirly patterns that resulted were as fascinating as any finished picture he had made.

When she had suggested that the black swirls could use some red, he had seen no reason not to find out. After all, the shallow cuts had been nothing that wouldn't heal on their own in a few days, or in a matter of seconds with Sakura's power to heal. And if the little nicks had left the girl writhing and begging on his still unmade bed with her legs spread wide and her chest thrust into the air, well, Sai couldn't say he wasn't similarly affected.

When she showed up on his doorstep again two nights after, Sai had realized just how affected he had been; he was very happy to see her. True, the cuts he placed on her flesh became deeper and more numerous as the weeks had passed, and the sex had become rougher, and recently Sakura had been asking him to do things like choke her or push her head into the bed, but none of that was lethal to such a talented medical ninja. And besides, _he_ was the virgin—how was he to know that all of this wasn't normal sexual expression? And so what if she did ask him to hide their relations from everyone else? Hadn't Asuma-sensei and Kurenai-sensei done the same thing with their relationship for three years?

But now he was confused. He knew Naruto was protective of his friends, but the reaction he had displayed the night before was more violent than anything Sai had seen since the blond battled Orochimaru. Had Sakura asked for something so strange that it had made Naruto react like that? Sai couldn't believe that. He trusted Sakura.

When he reached the training grounds finally, he was unsurprised to find Naruto already there; after all, the _kyuubi_ container was forever trying to strengthen himself and this was the place to do it. He was a bit surprised to see Naruto not moving, but merely leaning back against a tree with his head leaning slightly down onto his chest. Why had Naruto come early if not to train?

Sai got his answer when Naruto slammed him against a tree by the scruff of his collar: the _kyuubi_ container had been waiting for him.

"I take it you're still upset?" Said Sai cheerfully, with his usual smile. Perhaps if he tried to act happy, Naruto would see his good intentions.

Naruto instead decided that he was being made fun of. "What the hell kind of question is that? After what you did!"

"And what did I do?" Asked Sai, still smiling.

"You cut her, you bastard!"

"So did you, last week."

"That was training!"

Sai was confused enough to stop smiling. "I don't understand the distinction. Either way she winds up bleeding, doesn't she? She healed herself easily after being cut by you, and heals herself easily after sex with me. Why is it a problem?"

Naruto began to grow enraged all over again. All night he had sat up, growing more and more agitated and struggling to keep the demon within him from bursting free and wreaking havoc. It had taken everything he had not to just kill Sai on the spot, and now the other man dared to look him in the eye and ask him what the problem was?

Kakashi had to pull the two boys apart a moment later. Naruto cursed—his teacher had to choose today of all days to be only a little bit late!

"What's this, then?" Asked Kakashi sternly.

Naruto and Sai both hesitated, aware of Sakura's desire for privacy in this. Besides, neither thought there was any reason to speak: Sai was still convinced he had done nothing wrong, and Naruto was sure he could put things right by himself.

The two boys exchanged a glance of mutual understanding before turning back to their trainer. "Nothing, Sensei," said Sai calmly. "I stole some of his ramen, that's all."

It was clear from Kakashi's expression that he didn't believe a word of it, but as long as the two had stopped fighting he figured he might as well not push. He could always get the truth out of Sakura later.

Speaking of which… "Where's Sakura?"

Naruto blinked and looked around. "Yeah, where _is_ Sakura-chan?"

It was at this moment that a shuriken came flying towards Naruto's back.

With a curse of mingled surprise and worry, Kakashi reached out to pull his former student out of the way. He needed have bothered. Uzumaki Naruto was no longer any novice to the art of the sneak attack. The boy felt eyes on his back, heard the whistling of the deadly throwing star and saw the look on Kakashi's face, and that was enough. In an instant he had leapt aside and the weapon buried itself in the dirt where he had been standing.

The male portion of Team Seven was on alert when their attacker came out from behind the rock they had hidden behind. With their face totally covered by bandages and loose clothing adorning their body, the attacker made it impossible for Team Seven to determine if their enemy was a woman or a small man.

Whether a man or a woman, the attacker was deadly. Without pausing, they leapt at Naruto again, drawing a short sword in one smooth movement and aiming it right at his heart. The _kyuubi_ container was forced to leap back once more as he drew several _kunai_ and let them fly at his advancing enemy.

They dodged, of course, and then Naruto was again dodging a swing from the short sword. Why was this enemy targeting only him? They were acting as though Sai and Kakashi didn't exist!

The other two present members of Team Seven were looking for an opening to help. If they attacked rashly they might well hurt Naruto given how closely the two opponents were fighting.

"I'll put some distance between them," said Sai calmly, pulling out a brush and paper. Quickly he painted out an eagle, a giant creature with a wingspan as large as Kakashi was tall. The ink-bird opened its mouth in a silent screech before swooping from the page and moving for the two combatants only yards away.

Sai was sure that once he attacked, the masked ninja would see him as a threat and at the very least go on guard against him. He was mistaken. As the eagle swooped in and forced Naruto and his opponent apart, the masked ninja continued to act as though Sai was not there. Instead, they swung out at the attacking eagle, plainly eager to get it out of the way so they could attack Naruto again.

A personal grudge, wondered Kakashi? Oh well, it didn't matter. They'd just ask the ninja themselves once they'd taken them down. He ran forwards, his feet kicking up clouds of dust as he went and rammed his elbow right into his enemies head, sending the tiny body flying back with a sickening _smack_. Before they could rise Naruto had pressed the advantage, leaping forwards and kicking the short sword from his opponents grasp. Sai's eagle swooped down and took the sword before the masked ninja could even think to pick it up again.

Naruto dragged the masked ninja up by his collar, just as he had dragged Sai up earlier, and slammed them up into a rock. He was pulling his fist back, prepared to knock the other ninja into unconsciousness, when a scream from behind him pulled him up short.

It was Ino, running up to him with tears streaming down her face and destroying her usual thick makeup. Her hair was a mess, her clothes were disheveled and her eyes were so wide and stricken that she looked half mad. "Naruto!" She screamed, stumbling along and wildly windmilling her arms to keep herself upright. "Naruto don't, don't hurt her, don't!"

As Naruto looked away, the masked ninja slipped out from under his grip. He cursed. "Ino, goddamn it! Why not?"

Ino reached him, panting and wild. "You moron, you idiot, don't you see, can't you tell—_that's Sakura_!"

TBC

* * *

A/N

Big thanks to those who reviewed, you people make my day.

It had come to my attention that I called Monday's Dusk Noon a woman—when "she" is in fact a man. Deep apologies to MDN.

I'm not quite satisfied with this chapter as it is, so I might revise it later. We'll see.

REVIEWS ARE LOVE!


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Naruto isn't mine.

Warnings: Just some language this chapter.

Finding Sakura

By Michiru's Mirror

Chapter Three

* * *

"Okay, Shikamaru," said Ino, "I have a deal for you."

Yamanaka Ino was not as dumb as some people thought she was. She did, admittedly, have a broad shallow streak in her: she loved clothes and lavished more attention on her appearance than strictly necessary. But if these girlish leanings made some of the more unobservant think her stupid, well, that was their problem...and their loss. Ino never found it easier to defeat an opponent than when they underestimated her.

Shikamaru was not usually one of the people she could fool. First of all he simply knew her too well—years of watching her in action had clued him in to exactly how sneaky his blonde teammate could be when she wanted to be. Second of all, as a boy who had done his best to fool the world at large into thinking he was too lazy to think his way out of a paper bag let alone a fierce battle, Shikamaru was not prone to fall for any bullshit acts from others.

There were times that Ino could pull the wool over his eyes, though, when she tried hard enough and had the proper incentive. She did now: if Shikamaru was concerned about Ino's eating habits, Ino was almost frantic about Shikamaru's smoking. Aside from how detrimental it was to his physical health, it showed an alarming attachment to the memory of their deceased teacher. True, it hadn't been long since Asuma had died, and Shikamaru certainly seemed to be moving on in other ways. But Ino was still worried enough to decide it was high time to butt in, whether Shikamaru wanted the help or not (and he didn't, Ino had no illusions about that).

In the beginning she had just gone her regular route and nagged. That hadn't worked; instead it angered Shikamaru into grumbling about troublesome females who didn't know their place, which in turn angered Ino into giving him a black eye, which didn't help anyone.

Ino had been thinking of what to do when her teammates had dropped the solution into her lap. After Ino had started dieting again in an attempt to grab Sai's elusive attention, Shikamaru and Chouji had almost immediately begun making a fuss. She didn't understand why on earth they were making such a big deal out of a couple of little fainting spells, but they were. Just how big a deal they made out of it came to light when they started inviting her to dinner and spending money they really didn't have getting her to eat. Ino had realized right away just what they were up to (and deep down, she was quite touched by their devotion).

If they were really that worried, Ino knew she could use it to her advantage. She had been eating the food and letting the two boys think they had won in preparation for this day. She decided she had let them savor their "victory" long enough, and it was high time to pull the rug out from under them. When Shikamaru found his telepathic teammate in the alley behind her family's flower shop taking out garbage bright and early one morning, he asked her to accompany him and Chouji to Chouji's for dinner that night. Ino made a big show of turning him down.

"Can't you see how fat I'm getting? God, two months eating with you guys and I'm turning into a total cow! No more restaurants for me until I drop at least five kilograms!"

Shikamaru looked gratifyingly alarmed (which for him meant that he raised his eyebrows) and told her not to be stupid, it was just once or twice a week.

"No!" Said Ino firmly. "No, I'm never going to get Sai's attention if I'm fat." She pretended she didn't see Shikamaru roll his eyes. "There's nothing for it but to go back onto celery and water!"

In recent years Shikamaru had grown far more hardworking than he had been in the past, but purging himself of all his lazy habits was something he had yet to manage. Faced with a stubborn teammate, his frustration pushed him to abandon all complicated plans in favor of simple, straightforward rudeness. "Ino you stupid woman, you're not going to attract any man as a walking skeleton, you're just going to kill yourself!"

Ino plastered the most innocent expression she could muster onto her face and turned around. "Why Shikamaru, you sound really worried!"

She knew she'd gone too far with the unassuming, puritan act when her teammate's eyes narrowed in suspicion. Damn, he was on to her.

"...What do you want?" He finally asked in a deeply harried voice.

Oh well, if he'd caught on there was no more point in being coy. "Okay, Shikamaru," she said in a voice totally devoid of the mock-innocence of a moment ago. "I have a deal for you."

Shikamaru groaned loud and long, and when he did Ino plucked the cigarette from his mouth. "Hey!" He yelled.

"I want these," said Ino flatly. "If you never light one of these again, I'll bring myself up to 45 kilograms and stay there...permanently."

Shikamaru studied Ino's face and realized that she was deadly serious. She was putting her life in his hands.

"Oh you _bitch_," he said, and meant it.

"Yup," Ino agreed. "So what do you think?"

"I think," said Shikamaru with great hostility in his voice. Then he paused, and his gaze moved off of her to the roof of the Yamanaka flower shop. "...I think I´m looking at something really suspicious behind you."

"Nara Shikamaru, don't you dare change the subject!"

"No, look!" Shikamaru grabbed his friend's shoulders and spun Ino around to face the street. A masked figure in black was sitting on the next door ramen shop's roof, preparing to leap to the next building.

Ino looked back at Shikamaru, irritated. "So?"

"So why is that person masked and armed?"

"Because this is a ninja village, stupid! ANBU wear masks—"

"That person isn't ANBU. Besides, don't they just..._feel_ wrong to you?"

Ino gave her teammate a searching look. On one hand, he might well be trying to make her forget the subject. On the other hand, Shikamaru had unfailing instincts. "Don´t think I'm letting you off the hook," she said finally before leaping into the air after the masked figure.

In the very likely chance that their prey was just a wandering ANBU (or somebody like Kakashi who had a mask fetish), the teammates agreed to try talking first.

"Excuse me!" Ino called once they'd caught up. "Could we talk to you for a moment?"

The figure froze, and then took off twice as fast as before.

"Okay," admitted Ino, "That's a little suspicious."

Shikamaru glared at her as he sped by, doubling his own speed to catch the masked person. "You think?"

Ino kept an eye on the street as she leapt along, but saw no ninja who could help them. True, it was an ungodly hour, but even so there were plenty of civilians up and about preparing their businesses to open! What, were all ninja just late risers except for her?

Shikamaru yelled, "I'm gonna get him from a distance!" The leader of Team Ten wrinkled his brow as he concentrated, trusting Ino to let him know if he was about to trip. His shadow began to stretch along the ground against the rays of the sun, lengthening until it became a distorted ghoul-like shape upon the rooftops. Another leap and Shikamaru's shadow merged with that of his prey. Both of them froze in place, and Shikamaru called, "Over to you!"

Ino leapt in front of the imprisoned figure and put her hands to her temples. Shikamaru couldn't keep their friend trapped for long, so the easiest way to get him them over to Ibiki or the Hokage was for Ino to take their body and command it herself.

To Ino, pushing her mind into another's body was almost like birth. There was a feeling of comfort that she had in her own mind that was replaced by a disgustingly tight, pressurized feeling as she forced her way into a space of confusion and unfamiliarity. The horrible sensation passed after a mere second, but Ino dreaded it every time.

She counted seconds as she waited for the feeling to pass  
_  
__One, two, three_

waited for her mind to settle into its new home

_Four, five, six_

waited for her power to adjust in a strange new environment.

It didn't.

The pressure around Ino´s very essence began to grow stronger, shoving at her, pawing obscenely at her soul. Panicking, Ino tried to pull out, only to find herself trapped by the mind she had naively thought she could overcome and dominate with her own.

Ino screamed as loudly as she could, but didn't know if her body had successfully made a sound. She was lost, her mind and soul lost forever, doomed to be pushed and shoved and bent to the will of the horror that trapped her now...

"Ino! Ino!" Shikamaru was holding her body and slapping her face gently, and Ino had never been so happy to be slapped because it meant that she could feel her own body again. She was back in her own flesh.

"Oh my God, oh holy hell, of fucking shit—" Ino rolled out of Shikamaru's arms far enough to vomit up an alarming amount of stomach acid.

"Holy shit, Ino!" Shikamaru kept a grip on his teammate's shoulders until she finished. "What was that?"

Ino wanted to keep vomiting, wanted to hug Shikamaru until she felt her bones crack to remind herself she was alive. But the same loyalty that made her confront Shikamaru moments ago made her roll onto all fours now. Shakily, she pushed herself to her feet.

"Shikamaru," she said, "How much of a head start does she have?"

"Barely seconds."

Ino nodded, but stopped when it made her head spin. "Shikamaru, listen to me. I need you to go to the Hokage right now, as fast as you can, and tell her to send a squad down to the training grounds."

Shikamaru did not even think to argue. Thought Ino had relinquished the title of "team leader" to him long ago, he could tell by her tone that it wasn't ego, but worry, that made her give orders now. "Okay. She'll want to know why."

Ino looked Shikamaru right in the eye. "Because if she doesn't, Sakura, or Naruto, or both of them, are going to die."

* * *

Ino ran as fast as she could, but despite her best efforts her body was still appallingly weak. Her head spun, her feet slipped out from under her, she tripped and ran into people. In the end, it was a wonder she reached the training grounds at all.

But she did because she had to, and as she all but flew over the hill leading to the grounds she was treated to the sight of Naruto preparing to bash Sakura's head in.

"Naruto!" She screamed, stumbling along and wildly windmilling her arms to keep herself upright. "Naruto don't, don't hurt her, don't!"

As Naruto looked away from Sakura, she slipped out from under his grip. He cursed. "Ino, goddamn it! Why not?"

Ino reached him, panting and wild. "You moron, you idiot, don't you see, can't you tell—_that's Sakura_!"

"What?" Said Naruto as though he hadn't heard correctly. "But she's not...that's not...Kakashi-sensei, is this some kind of training exercise?"

But the Copy Ninja looked every bit as flabbergasted as his former student. Ino, who had collapsed to her knees in exhaustion, could offer no help either.

Sai, however, kept his head. With a swoop of his paint brush, he sent the eagle he had created after the masked ninja that Ino knew now was Sakura. She dissipated the ink creation with a single, mighty punch, but not before black talons ripped away the side of the ninja's mask. The assembled combatants could see none of their opponents face, but that moon-pale flesh and bright pink hair were horribly, shockingly familiar.

Naruto suddenly looked as ill as Ino. In his whole life he'd made two dear friends, and now even the one who had sworn to stay by his side had betrayed him.

The masked ninja—Sakura—stood frozen for a moment before running away over the grassy field without a word as though a nightmare were chasing her down. She was so fast that within seconds every trace of her had disappeared.

No one moved.

From the ground, Ino groaned and forced herself upright. Men were bloody useless without guidance! "What are you doing? Go after her!"

Kakashi gave her a look that would have frozen the devil in his tracks. "Do you know how strict the law has gotten since Orochimaru showed up? After what she's just done—and everyone's going to know with the racket you made coming down here—ANBU and the elders will all be screaming for her death. Even the Hokage won't be able to prevent it. Escape is her only chance."

Ino shook her head, frustrated enough to start hitting people. She was obviously not communicating the situation clearly. "No! It's not like that! Don't you—how could you even _think_ Sakura would betray us?"

"I'd like to know that myself," said a familiar voice. The four ninja turned to see the Hokage standing behind them.

"I've sent a party of ANBU out with specific instructions not to kill her, and they won't, at least until we get to the bottom of this."

Tsunade pointed at Ino, and fixed the full force of her gaze on the younger woman. "You, young lady, are coming to my office, where you are going to tell me just what the hell is going on. And you gentlemen—" her gaze swept across what remained of Team Seven "—are coming too. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that what Ino has to say involves you a great deal."

* * *

Twenty minutes later in the Hokage's office, Tsunade was finally able to shut her door on the men of Team Seven and all of Team Ten. Shikamaru and Chouji had wanted to be with their teammate, and Tsunade had not fought them. She fully wanted to encourage team unity, and besides, Team Ten could be trusted to keep their silence if Ino came out with anything personal. Shikamaru was too professional and Chouji too kind for it to be otherwise.

Ino was sitting in the chair across from Tsunade's desk, and the men were arranged around her in a loose but visible semi-circle. Wisely, though, the men of Team Seven were giving her some distance and hovered near the edge of the room. Tsunade was proud of their discretion, and decided to be like them; though she was too jittery to want to sit down, she forced herself to. Poor Ino might well be put even more on edge if the already intimidating Hokage stood over her like an interrogator.

"All right," said Tsunade as she settled down. "Let's hear it then."

Ino chewed at her bottom lip, mulling over the mishmash of images still floating in her head and wondering where to begin. Just as Tsunade was about to hurry her along, she spoke. "The kyuubi...you know, the gross demon that attacked out village years ago—" Naruto shifted by the wall, "—it's not the only demon out there, right?" And they're not all showy. Some a-are quietly destructive. Kinda like a virus."

Shikamaru frowned, trying to make sense of her words. "So Sakura is what, possessed?"

He hadn't meant it literally, and was thus very surprised when his words made Ino burst into tears. Chouji quickly offered his teammate his hand; she squeezed it until he winced. "I-it...the thing attached itself to her, months ago! I don't know when...b-but it's been sucking at her soul and feeding off her misery and every insecurity she's ever had!"

Ino was gasping between words, trying to force the story out around a total emotional breakdown, probably not even aware of the stir her revelation had caused. Again, Tsunade found herself proud of the other girls resolve and compassion.

The rest of the room were staring at each other, exchanging glances of horror and confusion, and clearly trying to make sense of what they'd been told. "These past months, she...she...oh God I'm so selfish, I was so caught up in this battle between me and Shikamaru I never even took the time to notice how strange she was acting!" A wail of despair burst from Ino's mouth, and Chouji had to rub her back for a moment while she calmed down.

"You noticed, though," said Tsunade to Kakashi while Ino sniffled. "From what I heard from you, Sakura has been acting...distracted?"

"And destructive," said Naruto flatly. Fuck privacy at this point, it was no longer just Sakura's ego at stake. "She's been having Sai...hurt her."

Tsunade swiveled hard eyes onto Sai. "What does that mean?"

To his credit, Sai did not hesitate. He wasn't sure where he stood with Naruto just now, but the young artist didn't doubt the other boy's loyalty to Sakura for an instant. If Naruto thought it was best to tell their Hokage the truth, then it must be best. Looking right into the Hokage's face with his own bottomless orbs he said, "Fucking, suffocating and cutting."

Hearing that your friend had been hurt by an enemy was one thing. Hearing that your friend was being hurt by another friend was a whole different kind of horror. The assembled ninja found that nothing in their experience, nothing in their training, even began to prepare them.

In the days that followed, Team Ten would recover from the shock as best it could. Chouji would go to his father and ask why anyone would want to hurt themselves so much that they'd humiliate and debase themselves, and be told that self-hatred made people do strange things. The rotund Akimichi would think of Ino, and how she would starve herself, and vow from the bottom of his too-gentle heart that he would do whatever he had to to keep her from self-destruction.

Shikamaru would also think about Ino starving herself and decide that this business with Sakura was yet another example of women being hideously stupid, like the inferior creatures they were. He would put it out of his mind, firmly ignoring his fear that Ino would wind up like Sakura…but he would accept Ino's deal nonetheless and stop smoking.

As for Ino, she felt her crush on Sai wither and die on the spot. In her worry for her best friend, the blonde forgot about Sakura's strong will, about how it was Sakura's choice to let Sai hurt her. She remembered only Sakura's gentle side, her kindness and compassion. "Oh, Sai," she whispered, and there was such disgust in her voice that Sai was taken aback.

He moved to go to her, but Chouji and Shikamaru immediately blocked his path. They weren't letting the freak near their teammate. Sai stopped moving and blinked. More people were mad at him? And these ones weren't even close to Sakura personally! What on earth was making everyone so _angry_?

Ino finally swallowed and forced herself to speak. "Sai…h-have your, uh, sessions with Sakura been getting worse?"

"If by worse you mean more extreme, then yes." Sai kept his gaze on Chouji and Shikamaru. They looked like they might attack him at any moment.

"That fits," Ino whispered, and choked slightly. "The thing...it...it's eating her, eating her soul from the inside. To her, it feels like...like..." Ino struggled to find words for the bottomless pit of despair she had fallen into in Sakura's mind, "Like horrible depression. Like she's drowning in self-hatred a-and worthlessness. I went into her mind and...God, it was like she was drowning in a tar pit, like she was sinking in filth! It's making her so angry at herself that she's b-been hurting herself.

"The demon has put itself into her mind as a trusted figure, a mother or a sister or an aunt. Someone she could reach for and depend on...and when Sakura reached for that help...she was...was..."

"Consumed," Shikamaru finished for her quietly, and Ino again began to shake with sobs. If just a glimpse of Sakura's fate had done this to her, how bad was it for Sakura herself?

"Ino," said Tsunade. Her voice was quite steady, and one had to closely observe the Hokage to notice that her hands were trembling just slightly. "Is there anything left of Sakura now?"

The room collectively held its breath.

"Yes," said Ino, and the mass sigh of relief was audible. "That's why...that's why it attacked Naruto." Ino ducked her head, avoiding the _kyuubi_ container's gaze. "It's going after people who..."

"Who she loves?" Chouji guessed.

"...Who hurt her," Ino finished quietly.

"I don't understand," said Sai with a frown. "Don't she and dickless here have a connection?"

"That's the nature of a connection," Kakashi replied. Rational man that he was, he was holding off on judgment of Sai until he heard all the facts from Sakura herself. Of course, if he found out that any of it was in any way Sai's fault the young man would die, but that was no reason to be rude to him at the moment. "When someone you're connected to says or does something to hurt you...it's probably the most painful thing that can happen to a person."

There was a sound that made everyone jump. Naruto had gripped his arm so tightly he had ripped through his sleeves. _This is sick,_ he had said to her. _This is disgusting…_

Tsunade spoke before anyone else could make the situation worse. "Okay then. We're just going to have to wait for the squad I sent out to bring her back, and then we're going to find a way to fix this."

But it wasn't that simple. It was less than an hour later than a frantic Shizune burst into the Hokage's office to report the ANBU squad on Sakura's tail had been found in pieces. Of Sakura, there was no sign.

"No way," said Chouji in a deeply awed voice. "Sakura doesn't have that kind of power!"

"The demon does," said Ino quietly. She had mostly recovered herself, though she was still pale. "It's so old..."

Sai shrugged. "It didn't seem so special when it went up against us."

"That's probably because it was us," said Kakashi. "I don't know why the demon wants to kill people who hurt her, but I'll bet my _sharingan_ that Sakura is fighting it with whatever she has left. She's too strong, and cares about us too much, to just let us be killed when she could prevent it."

"Well, if she's...I mean, if the demon is targeting her loved ones, even ones that caused her pain somehow, that means we want to put those loved ones under lock and key and be ready when it makes a try for them." Tsunade said, falling into the role of authority with ease. "We'll get her parents under guard, and Team Seven here too. And...who else?"

"Sasuke."

When Naruto spoke up the room paused. The boy hadn't said a word since exposing Sakura's secret, had only looked at the ground as though meditating on some subject far beyond the rest of them.

Tsunade found her voice. "What?"

Naruto raised his head, and there was no doubt in his face or his voice as he said: "She's going after Sasuke."

TO BE CONTINUED

* * *

A/N

I'm so, so happy about the reviews I've gotten, and I really want to thank all of you—both those of you who praised and those of you who criticized. I loved reading all the reviews.

Like chapter two, expect revision for chapter 3. I just feel I'm somehow writing the chapters too shallowly…like I'm not getting across some feelings or scenes properly, and that I'm rushing others. I shall work on them until they're perfect…if that's possible! And if any of you readers feel the same way and have suggestions, I'm very, very happy to hear them. I want to improve.

To answer some questions:

I obviously didn't make the pairings clear in the beginning. This story takes place between chapters 342 and 343, so Naruto and Sakura are NOT together as of the beginning. Naruto refers to Sakura as his because that's what he always does, not because Sakura actually considers herself Naruto's girl yet. Sleeping with Sai wasn't cheating.

As for what the pairings will be by the end…I'm not telling! What fun would the story be if everyone knew who winds up with who? It would kill the suspense!

And on the topic of Naruto standing by Sakura, I think that has less to do with him being in love with her (although make no mistake, I think that he is), and more to do with him being her friend. If he's not going to abandon Sasuke after Sasuke almost killed him, he's not going to abandon Sakura just because she had a little weird sex.

I don't think Sai is stupid, just naïve. This is a guy who can't figure out why the heck calling Sakura "ugly bitch" would make her mad.

That's it for now! Next chapter, the gang tries to find Sasuke before Sakura does…


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: Naruto is as much mine as Mexico City.

Warnings: Just language this chapter.

Finding Sakura

By Michiru's Mirror

Chapter Four

* * *

Tsunade didn't even try to keep Naruto from leaving Konoha. Though Naruto believed life was sacred, and called many people his friends, there were four people in particular who were as important to him as his ambitions and future: Umino Iruka, Hatake Kakashi, Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura. These four were irreplaceable in his heart and indispensable to his future. If he didn't have them he would become Gaara, so lost in his own misery that he might not make it—or so he thought. Personally, Tsunade doubted that any loss could crush Naruto completely at this point in his life. Perhaps when he had been a child, but not now.

Nevertheless, taking these people out of Naruto's life would be a bad idea. The idea of losing not just one, but two of them was enough to send him into a frenzy. That the two in question were the only two he considered peers instead of teachers or parental figures made it worse. That one or both of them might die by each others hands made it about as bad as it could be.

Tsunade did not fool herself: _Hokage_ or not, if she tried to tell Naruto "no" he would do anything up to and including sneaking past her or going _through_ her to reach his best friends. Besides, she had no reason to keep him back, given that she was as worried about Sakura as he. She herself was held from going anywhere by her duties as _Hokage_, and the combined might and intellect of Team Seven's remaining members had a better shot than most other teams Tsunade could cobble together anyway.

Team Ten was to act as the reserve team. They would follow Team Seven, staying no more than a few hours behind at any time, and in regular radio contact. They would provide backup if a major battle broke out, transport back to Konoha if someone in the main team was injured, and a medic in the form of Ino. Also, in case Sai turned traitor they'd be there to take him down. Tsunade had allowed the boy to go along with Naruto and Kakashi instead of being thrown in jail when Kakashi had promised to keep an eye on him, but she was still frighteningly enraged. She didn't trust him any more than she trusted Orochimaru, and Team Ten had her permission (and encouragement) to kill him if he exhibited any suspicious behavior.

Team Seven set out an hour after the briefing with Tsunade, with Team Ten set to follow in two hours. With light traveling packs on their backs, Naruto, Kakashi and Sai left the gates of Konoha at a run, kicking up dust in their wake. Seconds later Naruto was bounding through the trees at a frenetic pace that would have had Kakashi telling anyone else to slow down before they exhausted all their chakra. But Kakashi knew that Naruto had enough power to handle the pace for a good long time, so he let the boy get a bit ahead of himself and Sai. It wasn't a problem as long as he was leaving an obvious trail for them to follow and didn't get more than a few minutes away. Let him work off some steam.

Besides, from the way Sai was eying him, Kakashi guessed his newest team member wanted to talk. He'd seen it coming. With everyone else currently emotional enough to kill the boy, Kakashi was the only one Sai could ask the questions that had to be buzzing around in his head.

Kakashi patiently waited for Sai to begin. It didn't take long.

"Kakashi-sensei, may I ask you a question?"

Well _that_ was unusually polite. Kakashi understood, though—it was very intimidating to have all of your friends mad at you. Another drawback to "making connections" was how frightening the thought of losing them could be. "Sure, knock yourself out." He made sure to keep his voice light and friendly.

"People are angry at me," Sai began.

"Ah, yeah," said Kakashi, mercifully avoiding the obvious sarcastic response.

"I think I must have done something wrong to elicit such a violent response." Sai had fallen in line next to Kakashi, and was staring up at the older man with dark, confused eyes. "But I cannot think of what I have done. Sakura has no other lover, so there was no infidelity. I did nothing that she did not first request, so there was no rape. I hurt her no worse than you do during training." Sai paused to shake his head and frown. "Can you tell me what crime I have committed?"

It was Sai's turn to wait quietly while Kakashi thought of how to answer. Branches bent and snapped beneath the ninjas' feet, miles disappearing that Kakashi barely noticed as he turned possible responses over in his head. He could tell the boy that hurting women was wrong, but Sai was right that Kakashi did it himself all the time in training and on the battlefield. He could say that violence during sex was wrong, but if the boy found out about S&M he would just grow more confused.

"If all that's true," said Kakashi finally, "You're not at fault. People are angry because they love Sakura, and she's hurting, and you're a convenient target."

"What did I do to make myself into such a convenient target, then?"

"Ah, well, that's a more complex question." Kakashi grinned cynically under his mask, ducking out of the way of a large, looming hornets nest. "I s'pose the answer is that the type of sex you were having with Sakura is…abnormal. Some people, like Genma or Anko, would say that even though it's abnormal it's not bad. Others, like everyone in the Hokage's office an hour ago, would say that it _is_ bad."

"Why?" Sai's thick hair blew around his face with his movement, his eyes never leaving Kakashi's face.

"Because a lot of people think that causing physical pain to a lover—especially when the lover is female—is a horrible crime."

Sai looked no less confused, and even more frustrated. "But…but…what I did was no worse than—"

"—Than the bruises Naruto and I give her in training, right. First of all, when a girl becomes yours, you've taken on a responsibility to protect her that you violate if you hurt her. Much as Naruto might wish it otherwise, Sakura isn't his lover, and of course she's not mine. We haven't made any promises.

"Second of all is intent. Naruto and I don't enjoy hurting Sakura, and we don't do it for fun. We do it because if we let her become weak she'll suffer many worse wounds or even death in a real fight. To enjoy causing someone you care about pain is…strange. Which is why everyone got so disturbed and angry."

Though Kakashi could see a million holes in his hastily-constructed argument, Sai was nodding slowly as he leapt over a strangely angled branch. "I think I see. But in my defense, I don't think Sakura is 'mine'. She has shown no change in her behavior towards me out of bed, nor has she ever spoken about any of the subjects that I've read are associated with romance. And I am already too confused by friendship to want to worry about love at this point."

"Fair enough," said Kakashi. He didn't have a clue of how to explain that this would make the situation better in some people's eyes and worse in others.

"Kakashi-sensei," said Sai suddenly, "If I can ask, why wouldn't Anko or Genma say doing what I did was bad?"

Oh jeez. Kakashi wasn't even touching that one. Just because he liked to read about sex did not mean that he was going to go over the mechanics in detail with a sixteen year old kid. Sixteen year olds shouldn't know about sex in the first place, damn it.

A little voice in the back of his mind began to call Kakashi a hypocrite. _You lost your virginity long before sixteen!_

Kakashi suddenly felt very old.

"Well, you'll have to ask them about that. Some people just don't think hurting those you love in the way you did is bad, and if you want their opinion on it, talk to them. It has to be your decision whether to conform to their beliefs or ours.

"But I'll give you some advice. If you do decide to take the Genma/Anko route, you'd better be sure that you find a partner who doesn't have protective friends around her. If you touch Ino, for example, Chouji and Shikamaru will kill you. I don't mean they'll hurt you. They'll kill you. And if you try to slice up Sakura again, Naruto will kill you—and I'll help him."

While Sai couldn't fully see the smile Kakashi gave him thanks to the mask, he was eerily reminded of the smiles Tsunade gave before she beat people up.

* * *

Several months back, Team Seven had been sent on a mission to get information from Orochimaru's henchman Kabuto. Kabuto had, at that time, been thought to be an Akatsuki spy who was planted in Orochimaru's lair to get information. Unfortunately for the mission, this turned out to be untrue.

Thanks to that meeting, however, some very vague but important data had been passed into Konoha hands: Orochimaru was nomadic. He had a number of hideouts in his own _Otogakure_ village and in the countries surrounding it: small and large lairs hidden in rocks, trees and even the ground itself. Not a man to delude himself about just how many people wanted him dead, Orochimaru and his servants moved from hideout to hideout on a weekly basis.

Unfortunately, this was as particular as the information got. The only lair that Konoha knew about specifically was under a small island in a lake north of Otogakure. As Team Seven had already visited that base, and as Sasuke had blown an entire wall of the complex away last time they were there, it was easy to tell that neither Orochimaru nor Sasuke was going to be there. But it was as good a place as any to go first for clues.

The woods began to grow thinner the closer Team Seven got to Otogakure, and the trees that remained were less healthy and more stunted. Rock grew up to replace the foliage, bare rock, as though even sand and grass couldn't bear to be near Orochimaru's home. Rock was harder to traverse than forest, and with every jump Kakashi was kicking up a spray of gravel. That could be dangerous if Sai wound up behind him, and the unforgiving solid surface was hell for his ankles and knees. If he had to fight with aching joints, he obviously wouldn't be at his best.

Thought Sai had younger joints, the rough pace was obviously hard on him too. When they were less than a mile away from Orochimaru's lair, he quietly suggested they slow down. Kakashi readily agreed.

The problem was Naruto.

Kakashi and Sai hadn't thought anything of letting Naruto get a bit ahead of them, but they began to worry as the landscape grew more and more twisted. Jumping around wobbly rocks couldn't have been any more fun for Naruto then them, and rather than letting his teammates catch up he was just getting further ahead. As the stones grew sharp as knives and the few remaining trees began to resemble the twisted skeletons of beaten women, Kakashi almost said,_ He wouldn't go into Orochimaru's territory alone, would he?_

Then he stopped himself, realizing what a stupid thing that would be to say. It was Naruto after all. Instead, he turned to Sai just long enough to say, "Come on!" Before putting on an extra burst of speed.

He doubled his speed again less than a minute later when the all-too recognizable sound of Naruto yelling at the top of his lungs became audible, carried back to Kakashi's sharp ears on the autumn wind. _Oh God, not Naruto too. Please tell me I haven't just lost my last remaining student to his own recklessness—_

Naruto had not gone and killed himself, or anyone else, because there was no one left in this lair of Orochimaru's to kill. Team Seven had expected this. They had not, however, expected the base to look as though exploding tags had been set to every inch of it and set off all at once.

"Holy shit," Kakashi said as he came to a stop.

Naruto's choice of words was much more creative. He began by raging against the weather, went into a tirade against Orochimaru's ancestors, moved onto sex in all its vulgar forms and wound down by insulting the mating habits of dogs.

"Wow," said Sai, unusually impressed at Naruto's vocabulary.

"Don't you fucking 'wow' me! How are we going to get any clues from _this_?" Naruto almost shrieked.

"Naruto, calm down. This _is_ a clue," said Kakashi.

Sai nodded. "Only someone who knew this place was here could have done this, and the only people who know are Orochimaru's men…and ours."

"Yeah, and this work is recent," Kakashi said. "These ruins don't have any dust lying over them or plant life growing on them. They're days old at the most."

Naruto suddenly looked ill and put one arm to his stomach. "Then…then…"

"Don't jump to conclusions, dickless," said Sai in what was evidently supposed to be a comforting way. "I can think of a dozen people offhand who could have done this. It might not be Sakura." Abruptly, Sai sat down and pulled out a pen and a blank _makimono_.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"Looking for clues," said Sai as he scribbled. Naruto and Kakashi quickly jogged behind their teammate to discover that the boy was drawing flies—dozens of them. Naruto looked mystified, but Kakashi nodded his head.

"Ah. Good idea," he said.

Naruto's pride was spared the indignity of having to ask just what the good idea was when Sai finished his drawing and demonstrated. Forming the necessary hand seals, he took a breath and said, "_Ninpou—choujuu giga!_"

In an instant, the black blobs of ink began to shake in their paper prison. With a ripping sound the insects tore free, swarming the air in a silent burst. Naruto squawked and backed up, and even Kakashi held up a hand to protect his exposed eye. He didn't have to worry for long; the ink-insects almost immediately swept towards the ruins of Orochimaru's lair at their master's command, to seek out the clues that Team Seven had come to find.

* * *

Less than a mile away, Sakura's body leapt across the remains of the _Tenchi_ Bridge. The nameless demon, known to Sakura as "Auntie" felt the spirit of her host stir; there were memories attached to this place.

_I know, my darling_, said Auntie to Sakura's spirit. _I know. Don't you worry now; your Auntie will take care of everything._

_No!_ Shrieked Sakura. Auntie winced. Teenage girls were always so loud. _I don't want—_

_Of course you don't. You're a young girl who's been hurt so often she doesn't know what's good for her anymore._ Auntie sent out a wave of soothing chakra as she spoke, and Sakura immediately felt the effects. In moments she was soothed and drowsy, as though her mother was holding and comforting her. She was surrounded by love and protected from harm. _Well don't you worry, my dearest._ Sakura's spirit began to flicker and fade, sliding deeper into the layers of black tar that filled her subconscious mind. _I'll make that awful Sasuke see the error of his ways._

With Sakura safely out of the way, Auntie took her body to the edge of the _Tenchi_ bride. This was the perfect place—everything nearby had been blown away, leaving acres of clear space for her to use. It was a bother that Orochimaru's hideout had been so fully destroyed; there would be no finding anything there. She'd need to get some help if she ever wanted to track down Uchiha Sasuke.

Auntie was not a trained ninja, and could no more perform a _jutsu_ than sprout wings. Her particular brand of magic came from older and more sinister forces than chakra. It was a shame that nice young Sai wasn't here, Auntie mused as she pulled off one black glove and rolled up Sakura's right sleeve. Sadomasochism was simply delightful for calling spells of power. But plain ol' pain would work.

The demon drew a kunai and slashed Sakura's arm, not a tiny slice like the ones Sai would give her, but a deep meaty cut that slid through the fatty layers of dermis with horrible squelching noises like a boot pulling free from layers of mud. Mentally, Auntie sent out an apology to her host; Sakura wasn't going to be able to heal this cut until she "woke up". She'd be in time to prevent any permanent damage to her arm, but a nasty scar would be unpreventable.

_It's for your own good, you know._

Dipping her fingers under the skin with a hiss, Auntie smeared her left hand with blood and began to paint symbols on the rocks beneath Sakura's body. They were not kanji, but instead a language so old even the first Hokage wouldn't have known it. One would have to go back another dozen generations to know these words.

Finishing up, Auntie used Sakura's chakra to leap back and delighted in the fact that it was getting easier and easier to access her host's abilities. Perhaps in a few days she could try some _ninjutsu_—how exciting!

Taking a deep breath, Auntie called out a word that no living human could understand. For a moment nothing happened.

Then the demons appeared.

Red-eyed, slobbering demons crawled from the ground, clawing their way past mounds of rock. Blue-skinned brutes with horns and webbed feet emerged from the distant forest, waving clubs as thick as their muscled arms. Dozens of green and slimy monsters, like piles of mucus with the beady black eyes of flies slid across the terrain, their multiple eyes blinking out of tune and looking around at the creatures around them. Hundreds of demons, big and small, ugly and beautiful, flew, swam, crawled, ran and teleported to the _Tenchi_ Bridge where a queen waited for them. They surrounded her, bowing and scraping their way to her side.

Auntie smiled at her followers, her friends and servants, and spread Sakura's arms in a gesture of welcome.

She waited patiently while her followers settled down, their roars of greeting quieting into rustles and whispers. Then, drawing Sakura's diminutive body to its full height, Auntie said, "There is a man I need you to find."

* * *

Sai's ink-bugs couldn't talk to him the way that Shino's _kikaichuu_ could talk to their master, so they had no choice but to bring the clues that they found to the men waiting on the surface. In five minutes they brought up three things: scraps of black fabric that looked like the material used to make Sasuke's pants, a piece of white cloth with half an Uchiha symbol…and a few strands of brilliant pink hair.

"So they were both here," said Sai. Buzzing around his head like tiny black snowflakes, the ink-bugs slowly began to disappear. It seemed there was nothing else to show.

Naruto frowned. "Yeah, but they were here months ago too. Couldn't these be from then?"

Kakashi pulled out a _kunai_. "Let's find out." Swiftly, he cut his thumb. "_Kuchiyose no jutsu_!"

Pakkun appeared in a cloud of smoke, perched next to Sai's _makimono_. Blinking and sneezing the smoke out of his sensitive nose, Pakkun looked around to see two familiar faces and one new guy. "Whoa, who's the pretty boy?"

Sai beamed. Someone had finally given him a nickname!

Kakashi didn't even bother to say hello. "We're looking for Uchiha Sasuke—remember him?"

"'Course."

"Smell this." Kakashi stuck the scraps of white and black cloth under Pakkun's nose; the dog wrinkled his snout and drew back with a small _eugh_. "Is it recent? Can you track him by it?"

Pakkun leaned forwards with a look of deep distaste on his wrinkled features and took a sniff. "This is very recent—like, a couple of hours old recent. I can track him no problem."

Naruto leapt to his feet before Pakkun could finish the sentence. "Do it!"

Pakkun glared at him. "I don't take orders from you, you little—"

"Pakkun." The nin-dog was brought up short by the growl in Kakashi's voice. "Do it."

Pakkun blinked, shocked. What could worry Kakashi this much?

"…Right." Wisely not saying another word, Pakkun leapt off to the west, towards the Hidden Waterfall Village.

Team Seven did not speak a word as they ran after their guide. Though all three male members of Team Seven harbored very different sorts of feelings for Sakura, they shared deep concern for her. Tension sealed three pairs of lips into thin lines and creased three brows, until three very different men began to resemble each other a disturbing amount.

Naruto thought of very little. His determination to protect his friends superseded thought and made it unnecessary; only his will and his goal remained. Still, in the back of his mind, he couldn't help but wonder why Sasuke had been back to the non-secured base just hours before. Was it because the place had been destroyed—or was he the one who had blown it up?

Kakashi's thoughts were more complex. There was very little point to worrying about the upcoming unavoidable battle, because he knew what he was going to do then: fight for Sakura's life. That was a given. What was harder to decide was what to do with Sakura after they rescued her.

Sakura would not forgive herself easily for what she had done. True, she had been under the influence of a demon, but if there was ever a girl born who could blame herself for the falling of the rain it was Sakura. She would hate herself for a long time; for attacking Naruto, for misleading Sai, and for losing her virginity in what could safely be called an undignified way. In his head, Kakashi was already structuring a "don't blame yourself" speech and making a list of _kunoichi_ who could properly counsel Sakura through the confusing and humiliating days to come.

All of which would be moot if Sakura died or killed Sasuke, of course. There would be no helping her then.

Kakashi found that idea too chilling to even contemplate, and pushed it away as quickly as the speed of thought allowed.

If Kakashi's thoughts were complex, Sai's were a mess. Though he was a bit clearer on just why everyone was angry with him, he didn't have a clue of what to do about it. Did he apologize? Did he start researching sex to find out what he was normally supposed to do? Were he and Sakura now supposed to be lovers now that they'd had sex as Kakashi had implied? Could his friendship with Team Seven be saved, or had he worked so hard to understand what a connection was only to lose it now?

Miserably, Sai wondered if having friends was worth this. Right now, he couldn't see how it could be.

* * *

Though a corner of Naruto, Kakashi and Sai's minds were focused on their musings, they noticed when the terrain began to change. The first obvious difference was the vegetation; it moved quickly from bare rock to lush and exotic plants and trees. Concerned as they were, Team Seven couldn't help but be amazed at the diversity. Colors Sai and Naruto had thought could exist only in fireworks and paintings were all here, bright and beautiful. And the smells! Wildflowers and fruits, fresh grass and sunny skies all blended together to make intoxicating scents unlike anything Konoha city dwellers could imagine.

But all that majesty came with a price. Soon Team Seven was panting and sweating from the increased humidity that pressed down around them. It was autumn, but this was like Konoha in its worst summer months! Kakashi's mask began to feel like wet plaster of paris against his face, and his breathing grew more and more restricted until his lungs were almost on fire. Sai began to regret the little shirt that he wore, and Naruto quickly shed his orange jacket, leaving himself in only the mesh undershirt. What could this place be like in summer?

Whatever, it wasn't helping their already tired bodies and low chakra levels. If they had to fight with anybody in this condition, they'd be in real trouble.

Strangely enough, they had yet to come across any people. Was Sasuke keeping himself in seclusion to train? Or had he been hurt badly enough that he'd gone into hiding? Or…Naruto bit his lip, something he'd done so much in the last hour that it was almost bleeding. Or had Sakura cornered him out here?

Pakkun jerked to a stop so suddenly that Sai almost tripped over him. Kakashi had to grab the younger man's arm to keep him from falling on his face. "Pakkun, what—!"

"Everybody get back!"

Too late. There was a noise from deep underground, a rumbling sound like the beginning of an earthquake. From below Team Seven the ground erupted upwards, pelting the retreating team with chunks of earth as large as their own heads.

Naruto landed on the ground with a sickening _thud_ many meters away from where he'd been thrown. _Oh God, Kakashi-sensei—_

Heedless of his aching body, struggling with everything he had, Naruto put his hands underneath his chest and pushed, fighting to right himself. Where were his teammates?

He caught movement out of the corner of his right eye and froze at the familiarity of what he was seeing.

It couldn't be!

Slowly, his screaming neck protesting with every move, Naruto turned his head as far to the right as it would allow.

Uchiha Sasuke was walking up from the smoking crater that used to be a patch of ground, not fifty feet from where Naruto lay.

"Sas…Sas…" Naruto gasped. His voice wouldn't obey him, but Sasuke heard. Raising his dark head, Sasuke saw Naruto and raised an eyebrow as though seeing his estranged friend was of no great interest. He seemed none the worse for wear, at least. In fact, Sasuke was the very picture of health. Naruto was so relieved he momentarily forgot everything but his friend before him, whole and alive. A smile stretched across his face, the widest smile he'd managed since watching Sakura be cut outside Sai's window.

Sasuke was not so sentimental. He looked at his former teammate as though contemplating an uninteresting bug that had alighted on his wall. Wordlessly, he then turned around and began to walk away.

The smile didn't fade so much as fall from Naruto's face. "No!" He managed to gasp out before beginning to choke. He tried to scream, to tell the other boy what he'd been through, what he'd seen; his lungs burned with all the words constricted in them. But exhaustion and pain and dust robbed his throat from doing anything but coughing so hard that Naruto thought he might vomit.

They'd come so far! They'd almost exhausted their chakra reserves traveling across two countries just to warn Sasuke of the attempt against his life. They couldn't fail now when they were sprawled out almost next to their goal—fate couldn't be that cruel!

But it was. Sasuke had turned his back to his old comrades, and was walking away at an almost leisurely pace, flaunting Team Seven's helplessness. "Sasuke…" Naruto tried to cry, but his head was throbbing and ringing and his throat was so sore from coughing that he could barely whisper. "Danger…Sakura-chan is…"

Naruto did not know whether Sasuke had heard him, but if he did, he did not look back. In moments, the Uchiha had disappeared from Naruto's vision.

Naruto closed his eyes, and quietly fainted.

TO BE CONTINUED

* * *

A/N

Phew! Eleven pages!

I'd like to thank my wonderful and talented new beta, Ceras Gala, for giving me such a great critique on this chapter. She's kindly done the earlier chapters too, so I can revise them properly in the near future. Go read her stuff, she's really good.

Looking online at a map of the world in Naruto, Hidden Waterfall Village is a smaller ninja village northwest of Fire Country, and I don't think we know a damn thing about it at this point in the manga! I'm guessing on the weather by its proximity to the ocean. (Actually, the most challenging part of this chapter—and the reason it took me so long—was re-reading about 58,000 chapters of Naruto to see just what Konoha knew about Sound Village and what the place looked like. I adore Naruto, but after THAT much Naruto in one week, I think I'll take a break for a few days!)


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the story itself.

Warnings: Language, some sex.

Finding Sakura

Chapter Five

By Michiru's Mirror

* * *

_Sai didn't like his new apartment nearly as much as he'd liked his old one, but he supposed it was good enough. The tiny indent in the wall that served as a kitchen and the small bathroom were nice, but the most important thing to him was the one large room that took up the rest of the apartment space. He used it for everything from painting to sleeping to eating._

_Sai's favorite part was the huge window in the wall; he had put his bed right next to it, and enjoyed the breeze which he could count on almost every night while he slept. It was good for painting, too. All he had to do was pull out his canvas and set it next to the window for lighting more perfect than any light bulb could create._

_Sakura had discovered another use for it once they began having sex: she enjoyed being displayed in front of it._

_Sai was surprised to find this out, because Sakura seemed to make such a big deal out of keeping their relationship a secret. Wasn't she worried about someone seeing her?_

_Sakura giggled. "No, silly. You have a huge overhang above the first floor of this building, so no one can see me even if they look up."_

_This would have been a good point in a village full of civilians, but in a ninja village where anyone could just jump up into the tree next to Sai's window, he couldn't quite see how she was protected by the overhang. He began to wonder if, deep down, Sakura wanted to get caught._

_But he acquiesced to her wishes, and tied her sometimes to the bed and sometimes to the windowsill, where any passing ninja with some chakra to spare could watch as Sai gagged Sakura before pumping into her so hard she couldn't walk for hours after._

_One day, he discovered something else that was strange about their copulation. _

_Sai had looked in his cupboard one morning and realized quickly that unless he wanted to turn into Naruto, he had to go to the store and buy something to eat that wasn't noodles. He made it out the door and halfway down the stairs before realizing he'd forgotten his wallet. Tripping his way back up the stairs and through his door, he finally managed to locate the stupid thing only to find it falling apart at the seams. He _had _to remember to buy a new one. For real this time._

_He made it to the corner store after two minutes of ignoring people who tried to catch his attention to say hello. He knew it was a good idea to try and be friendlier to the people around him, but it was just exhausting sometimes. He'd been up all night with Sakura, trained all day with Kakashi, painted that stupid phoenix that he _still_ couldn't get right for two hours after that, and was due to entertain Sakura again tonight. And he didn't have any food. He was not in the mood to put up with stupid people who seemed to think that they had to say hello every time they saw him. How much free time did they have?_

_The corner store was as tiny as it sounded, but it had everything he'd need in a pinch. Rice and vegetables would be fine until he could get to the proper market the next day. Sai was looking at a particularly large _daikon_ radish and trying to decide if it was worth the price when a male voice floated back to him over the shelves._

"_I just…get the feeling I'm doing something wrong."_

"_I am NOT having this conversation with you!"_

"_Please? I don't know anyone else who might have the experience to help me!"_

_Sai blinked and straightened up. Though he couldn't see over the shelves of canned goods behind him, he could easily recognize the voices he was hearing as Akimichi Chouji and Asuma Sarutobi. Just what had made Chouji sound so desperate? It sounded like a life and death situation—but in that case, why would Asuma-sensei sound embarrassed?_

"_I can't even believe this," groaned Asuma-sensei. There was a rustling sound. "Okay, I'm going to tell you this once, and then if you ever ask me to repeat myself I will take all your potato chips and burn them, got it?"_

_Sai didn't hear an answer, but assumed Chouji must have nodded since Asuma-sensei continued. He spoke very fast._

"_Okay. Sex. Please tell me you at least know the mechanics."_

"_If I didn't know that, I wouldn't know I was doing it wrong!"_

"_Right, right. So, after you, uh, finish, what do you do?"_

"_Fall asleep, usually."_

_There was a horrified pause. "Right away?" asked Asuma, sounding as affronted as Sai had ever heard him sound._

_Chouji's voice was defensive. "Well, she's got so much energy! By the time she's done with me, I can barely—"_

"_Okay, on a scale of one to ten, my eagerness to hear the rest of that sentence is a negative five. Listen, you cannot fall asleep right away. Women get so pissed when you fall asleep right away. Last time I did that, Kur—uh—my date threw me out the door naked. You have to be affectionate. Hug her or stroke her hair or some other romantic bullshit. If it bores you, she'll probably like it."_

"_I see," said Chouji, now sounding thoughtful. "So girls go for extraneous contact."_

"_Yeah, and they shut you off of the kinda contact you want if you don't give it to them. So give. Take a minute before you go to sleep. She'll appreciate the effort, if nothing else."_

_Sai thought about Asuma-sensei's words as he walked slowly home, bumping his shopping bag on his knees with each step. Was that true? Did Sakura want gentle touches as well as the more violent ones he gave her? She hadn't said anything, but Asuma-sensei and Chouji's conversation made it sound like their girlfriends hadn't said anything either. Was this one of those things that girls just expected boys to figure out on their own?_

_When he thought back on it, Sai realized that they had never kissed, not once. Wasn't that usually a necessary step before sex?_

_Well, Sakura must have been waiting for him to figure all of this out. She'd be thrilled that he had—he'd show her this very night!_

_It didn't work out as Sai had planned it, of course. He was getting used to this by now, since most of his other experiments into humanity had failed so badly. Trying to explain Naruto's feelings to Sasuke had bombed, giving people nicknames had made everyone furious, and trying to feed Naruto when the blond was unable to do so himself apparently ruined a moment between him and Sakura. It wasn't too much of a surprise that his experiments with sex would turn out just as badly._

_Sakura came over that night, sliding through his door like a pink-tinted shadow and removing her coat as soon as he shut it. Without meeting Sai's eyes or saying a word she began to strip, removing her red dress and black shorts, folding them, and draping them neatly across Sai's currently empty canvas. Sai watched her, fascinated by how clinical her movements were. _

_His paintings were different that night. Instead of phoenixes, Sai found himself drawing tigers mauling antelope and dragons crushing birds in their jaws. Somehow, these were images that resonated with him, pictures that struck him as _true._ He didn't understand why, or how he knew, but these images were correct for Sakura._

_Sai remembered Asuma-sensei's words that night, and decided to try and follow what sounded like good advice. Rather then cutting, Sai moved straight to the sex, and took care to be gentle._

_But Sakura didn't come that night. Not once. Not when he stimulated her clitoris, not when Sai changed positions and angles, not when he tried going faster or harder. Sai was at a complete loss. Usually she had multiple orgasms each session. What was wrong?_

_When he'd finished his own disappointingly mediocre climax, Sai reached up to untie Sakura, and put his arms around her as he'd heard Asuma-sensei advise._

_Sakura immediately went so stiff in Sai's embrace that it became uncomfortable to hold her. Hesitating, not sure if he was doing something wrong, Sai sat up and brought Sakura with him. Though her back was to his chest, it was a simple matter to take her shoulders, turn her around, and kiss her._

_The reaction was immediate. With a slight scream Sakura launched herself back off of Sai's bed by kicking out. She landed in an undignified heap of ink and limbs on the floor, but leapt up before Sai could even ask if she was all right._

_Sai was so taken aback by the terror on Sakura's face that his first instinct was to look behind him to see what it was that had disturbed her so. But there was nothing there except the usual tree, and so Sai turned back to his companion. Sakura had begun to tremble while he had looked elsewhere, and was shaking so violently by the time Sai turned to look at her again that he almost thought she was having some sort of seizure._

_Standing up, Sai moved forwards to take Sakura's shoulders so he could sit her down and calm her, but she jerked back from his touch with another little cry. Sai knew better than to try and touch her after that._

_Breathing heavily, shaking so hard that she could barely dress herself, Sakura left Sai's apartment. She didn't return for over a week, leaving Sai to try and understand just what had happened._

_Sai thought he understood now, thanks to what Sakura's friends had told him._

_Their sessions together had been like hospital appointments to Sakura; times to get something she needed to function. She had been sating some deep sickness within her and nothing more. Compassion, romance, intimacy…these were things she hadn't wanted, because she'd felt she hadn't deserved them, and even the barest hint of them had been enough to disturb her. Sakura had not gone to Sai for pleasure. She had gone to Sai because she truly felt she had no right to feel good, and only Sai had been able to make her feel as bad as she'd needed to.

* * *

_

Sai felt hands on his body, and then a warmth that spread through his limbs as the hands stroked up his torso and sides. A small sigh escaped from his mouth, and his forehead crinkled as he struggled to open his eyes.

There was no pain or discomfort, only a lingering feeling of heaviness, as though a blanket that weighed as much as he did had been thrown across his body. Opening his eyes took time, willpower, and real effort.

Sai's eyes came into focus after a small number of seconds had passed, and the tense face of Yamanaka Ino filled his vision.

"Hi, _Bijin-san_," said Sai sleepily. Wasn't there something he was supposed to remember? Why was Ino touching him…and why wasn't she smiling the way she always did when he called her _Bijin-san_?

Sai felt the heaviness begin to leave him, and he tried to sit up. Immediately, with that disturbingly tense look not leaving her face, Ino locked her slender arms around Sai's shoulders and helped him. Fuzzily, Sai wondered if she wasn't smiling because she was still mad at him for what he'd done to Sakura.

Then when he looked around, he realized it probably had more to do with them being under attack.

"Oh," he said stupidly.

* * *

Chouji swore loudly and emphatically as he ducked under a broad blue arm. His opponent was a nightmare horror: a huge blue creature with rolling, bloodshot yellow eyes and teeth as long as his fingers. Strands of foam dripped from its enormous mouth, and its arms had both huge bulging muscles and sharp claws. Its strength was truly impressive, putting even Akimichi males on soldier pills to shame.

If Chouji didn't know any better, he'd say this was a demon from the bedtime legends his mother would tell him as a child. He supposed it was possible—after all he'd seen in the last twenty-four hours, he could believe just about anything.

It was just his luck that he was the only one who could fight the damn thing. Shikamaru had tried to grab it from a distance with his shadow technique, only to find that it was so strong that it could pull out of his hold. Without him holding it in place, Ino couldn't even begin to try to grab on to its mind.

Besides, given what had happened last time she went into the mind of a demon, Ino was understandably nervous about doing it again.

So, they were making themselves useful in other ways while Chouji tried to brave his nightmares and not run screaming from the creature in front of him. He grunted as a huge blue fist smacked into his open hand, forcing him back in a spray of gravel and dirt. He was sweating heavily now, almost unable to see for the liquid trailing into his eyes.

_Shikamaru, hurry up and think of something!_

When Team Seven had fallen out of radio contact, Ino had searched for them by taking over the mind of a soaring brown eagle. It was just luck that they had managed to show up minutes before the demon did.

No one in Team Ten had the slightest clue of what was going on. What had caused the explosion and why Team Seven was unconscious was a mystery—but it was clear to anyone that the demon was attacking them, and Team Ten knew their duty.

Ino, who had already been in the process of healing Sai, had just continued on while her teammates went up against their attacker. When Shikamaru had proven to be useless against it, he had instead set to the task of moving Naruto and Kakashi's prone bodies out of the way of Chouji's huge flying fists and over to Ino, where they could hopefully be revived.

Kakashi was a heavy guy. Groaning and feeling like the weakest man in Konoha, Shikamaru had been reduced to grabbing the other man under the armpits and heaving him across piles of rubble and refuse. Shikamaru felt bad for leaving Naruto, but he did look like he was in better shape than his teacher (Naruto healed amazingly quickly—it was almost like he wasn't human) and Shikamaru wasn't strong enough to carry them both at the same time.

Shikamaru arrived at Ino's side just in time to hear her roaring at Sai in her Leader Voice. "What the hell are you sitting there for? _Go help!"_

Shikamaru grinned internally. It was so nice to hear Ino yell at someone _else_ for a change.

The Leader Voice worked, apparently, since Sai went running by Shikamaru only seconds later to go join Chouji. He was bruised and battered, but obviously quite fit with nothing broken. Shikamaru felt proud; Ino would never have the power or the skill that Sakura did at healing, so she had learned to conserve the power she had to save as many lives as she could.

Not that he could tell her that. First of all, if he even suggested that Sakura had more skill than Ino did at anything Ino would fly into a truly impressive tantrum, and second of all Nara Shikamaru did not give compliments. Period.

Ino didn't say a word when Shikamaru came over to her, but just grabbed Kakashi's vest and lowered him to the ground to begin working on him. Shikamaru was proud again. What a pro.

But then, as he was turning around to go get Naruto, he heard Chouji's panicked voice: "We've got trouble here!"

Shikamaru swiftly turned to see the trouble: more demons. Three of them to be exact, lumbering over the uneven ground towards Team Ten. "Oh," he said stupidly. It was a mercy that he'd never know just how much like Sai he sounded.

Quickly, Shikamaru shook his head from side to side to clear it. There was no time for this!

"Come on!" he called to his teammates, bounding into a run. "This is hopeless—we're retreating, _now_!" Skidding to a stop beside Naruto's prone form, Shikamaru stopped only long enough to haul the other boy uncomfortably onto his back. "Chouji, you're carrying Kakashi-sensei! Sai, cover him!"

Chouji immediately responded to Shikamaru's command and bolted for Ino and Kakashi before Shikamaru had finished speaking. Sai quickly pulled out the only pen he had that hadn't been damaged in the explosion, and put it to a _makimono_. He'd been drawing a lot of eagles lately, but one seemed like the best thing now to give their retreat some cover.

The eagle attacked Sai's opponent with a screech, knocking it back, and it was then that Sai made the mistake of lowering his pen. Surely the demons would stop to help their friend.

They didn't. As one demon fell with Sai's eagle clawing at its eyes, the other three ran right past it, not stopping to so much as look at their fallen comrade. Sai quickly leapt back out of their way, hoping to avoid swiping claws and snarling fangs.

One of the demons, a small, flaming red creature was upon Sai before he could land. Bony claws swiped at his exposed midriff, and three deep cuts slowly turned pink before becoming as red as the demon that had caused them. Blood began to fall in a slow trickle as Sai landed; the attack had ruined his trajectory, and he found himself landing on his bottom rather than his feet. His breath left him in a sharp _whoosh_, pen and _makimono _flying from his hands and leaving him with nothing but a few kunai to defend himself.

Shikamaru swore and sent one of his own kunai flying at the red demon; it hit the thing's shoulder and knocked it away from Sai. Behind him Chouji was frantically trying to attach Kakashi to his back while Ino kept working on the worst of his injuries.

"Hurry up!" Shikamaru yelled at them.

"Look, if you think you can heal him faster, be my guest!" Ino snapped back.

Sai had regained his footing and ran towards them. "Anything I can carry?"

"No, just run!" With Naruto on his own back, and Kakashi firmly strapped to Chouji's, the four conscious ninja sprang into the air and ran as fast as they could.

"Everybody head east!" Shikamaru called. If they could get back to land that had some cover—rocks, trees, anything—they could make a stand. Here out in the open with no weapons and opponents who were stronger even then Chouji, they were dead.

Ninja though they were, they were human beings with limits to their strength. Ten minutes of hard running passed, and then twenty, and then Ino fell. All of her chakra had been used up on the injured members of Team Seven, leaving her without even enough to run anymore.

"Ino!" Shikamaru heard Chouji cry behind him. Fuck.

Well, if Ino hadn't fallen, one of them would have soon enough, Shikamaru admitted to himself. He had never exactly been a fountain of chakra, and Chouji had been expending a lot of energy earlier in the fight.

The red demon that Shikamaru had stabbed earlier was upon Ino, clawing at her and snarling. She screamed and performed a clumsy backward roll that barely took her out of the demon's path.

"Chouji, drop Kakashi-sensei—there's nothing we can do for him if we're dead!" Shikamaru ordered as he untied Naruto from his back. Chouji complied before running to Ino's side to help her. Fine, let him take care of that one.

To Shikamaru's relief, it seemed the huge blue demon from before had been taken down by Sai's eagle. That left them with three smaller opponents, one of whom had a serious shoulder wound. Even better, Shikamaru could hear Naruto beginning to moan and stir on the ground. With any luck, it would be a matter of holding the demons off until Naruto woke up enough to kill them with that ridiculously big wellspring of chakra he had.

Shikamaru ran into battle. There were two demons left: a green mucus pile with multiple eyes and a roughly humanoid black shape that was stooped over like an arthritic old woman. "Sai, take the black one," he ordered, collected as always. If the green mucus pile was as inhuman as it looked, it might not have its heart in any place Sai could stab with his kunai. But maybe Shikamaru could grab it with his shadow…

Used to having his orders followed, Shikamaru didn't even bother to check that Sai was doing as he said. Instead, Shikamaru leapt towards the green creature and stretched out his shadow.

There was a sound like a plunger sucking filth from a hole. Shikamaru's shadow, instead of catching hold of the green monstrosity was being sucked _into_ it, sinking deeper into the disgusting creature with each second. Grimacing, Shikamaru tried to pull his shadow back to himself, only to find that he couldn't.

Swearing under his breath, Shikamaru dug the heels of his boots into the ground and tried to hold on. Inch by inch the demon was sucking his shadow in, and his body was following. He would be eaten alive, his body sliding into that green muck with all the resistance of water sliding down a pipe…

Vaguely, in the back of his mind Shikamaru heard a voice. It did not shout, but spoke in so commanding and firm a tone that he could not help but hear: "_Chidori nagashi_."

There was light, a lot of it, searing through the clearing like blue lightning. And suddenly Shikamaru heard birds, a thousand birds crying out as though they were inside the lightning itself. Throwing his arms to his head, for his arms were suddenly free, Shikamaru crouched to the ground and waited for the storm to be over.

It was easy to tell when it was; even through his arms the light had been so bright and the chirping so loud that he could see and hear them. Slowly, blinking and dazed, Shikamaru lowered his arms and looked around.

To his left were Chouji and Ino, helping each other to stay upright as they gazed as the charcoaled remains of their opponent. To his right was Sai. Though he was nursing a new gash on his leg, his opponent was just as dead as Chouji's. And, looking in front of him, the splatters of green mucus splashed around made it clear that Shikmaru's own enemy was taken care of too.

There were scraping sounds from his far left, and Shikamaru whipped around to see Naruto struggling feebly to his knees. Naruto hadn't done this, then. Who had?

Naruto rubbed his eyes, and looked to Shikamaru's far right, past Sai. He smiled, looking so dazed that Shikamaru could tell he hadn't come all the way back to reality yet.

"I knew you'd come," said Naruto, and his voice was not full of its usual hyperactive cheer. Instead Shikamaru heard a joy so pure that he was almost taken aback.

Shikamaru heard a sigh from the spot where Naruto was looking. He turned again to see what made Naruto so happy, and immediately understood.

Uchiha Sasuke was sliding his sword back into the sheath he kept tied at the back of his waist. He walked towards them with casual indifference, as though nothing had happened…but his appearance said otherwise.

His clothing was ripped in a dozen places, his exposed chest full of developing bruises, his hair a mess and his right eye almost sealed shut from swelling. Shikamaru had to wonder how that had happened. If Sasuke could so easily beat the opponents that had give Shikamaru's entire team so much trouble, what could have done this to him?

Sasuke straightened up and stopped in front of Naruto, staring straight at his old teammate and no one else.

"You want to tell me what's going on?" said Sasuke.

* * *

A/N

No, I'm not going to tell you which girl Chouji got. I'll be interested to know if you can guess, though. grin

Team Ten needs love. I was so fricking disappointed when they finally got a fight of their own against the Akatsuki, and then Team Seven had to show up and take it away. I thought I'd let the opposite happen here. :)


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the story itself.

Warnings: Violence and a little language.

Finding Sakura

Chapter Six

By Michiru's Mirror

* * *

Uchiha Sasuke had a much more difficult time walking away from his old teammates then he thought he would, and that irritated him deeply. He had chosen the life of an avenger, had worked so hard to break all ties with his former comrades, and _still_ he had the urge to help them!

He had no use for such ridiculous, childish notions. When he had emerged from Orochimaru's just-destroyed lair to see the males of Team Seven sprawled around him like discarded toys, he made a point of walking away as fast as he could. With any luck they would die from their wounds and he wouldn't have to worry about them any longer. If Naruto's words (_Danger…Sakura-chan is_…) meant that Sakura was on her way to death as well, so much the better. Everything that represented his life in Konoha would be out of his life in one clean sweep.

Besides, it wasn't like he didn't have places to be. He had trained for almost three years to become strong enough to kill Orochimaru, and now that he'd done it he didn't have time to just sit on his laurels. He had to announce to the world in general, and his brother in particular, that he had become a force to be reckoned with; what better way to do that then by destroying everything Orochimaru had built up?

Orochimaru had thirteen hideouts scattered across five countries. The six in the Hidden Sound Village and two of the three in the Hidden Waterfall Village were taken care of. Just one more in Waterfall, and he could move on to the sole hideout in the Hidden Grass Village. If the people in these hideouts were smart enough to run, they could go, since nothing would get the message to Itachi faster than word of mouth. He didn't kill the fools who stayed behind—they, after all, meant nothing—but the beating he gave them was enough for gossip, and gossip quickly inflated.

Sasuke was fast growing a reputation as a merciless killer without ever killing a single person. That was just fine with him. He was ready to show Itachi just what he was made of. His brother had made him a monster, and now that mistake would come back to him. Sasuke thought of little else…except for the occasional random tendril of thought that would creep into his brain and remind him that Naruto had been caught in the explosion _he_ had made destroying Orochimaru's base, that Naruto could be dying and it would be his fault…

_Good! _ Sasuke snapped at the inner voice. _Good, he needs to die so my ambition can live!_

None of this conflict showed on Sasuke's porcelain face. He had learned years ago the dangers of showing emotion on his face or through body language. If he didn't yet have perfect control over his heart—and he would, someday—he could at least have perfect control over his face. But those few who knew Sasuke would be able to tell just how bothered he was by his lack of attention to his surroundings. That was a mistake that could be just as fatal as the showing of emotion, and Sasuke knew it. As quickly as he could (and much faster than any normal person could have managed it), Sasuke brought his rebellious mind under control.

But he wasn't quick enough to catch sight of the tiny red demon that marked his location and scurried back to report to its Queen.

It was perhaps ten minutes later that Sasuke felt a vaguely familiar _chakra_ signature coming towards him from the east. He paused and lifted his head as though trying to scent the air, and let the signature come to him.

It _couldn't_ be Sakura, could it? No, impossible! This _chakra_ signature was much too powerful for her, much too strong and aggressive. Besides, this signature was just plain different from hers somehow—it was as though someone had taken threads of Sakura's _chakra_ and woven another's _chakra_ threads through them.

The wielder of that signature was close enough now that Sasuke could see them as a tiny speck on the eastern horizon, coming closer at a very rapid pace. Sasuke waited patiently. He was curious about just who it was, and as an Uchiha, he had no reason to be afraid. His brilliance was beyond anything the approaching _shinobi_ could hope to threaten him with.

The speck drew closer until he could vaguely make out limbs, and then a shock of bright pink hair that proved beyond a doubt that it was Sakura after all. How odd. Perhaps she'd taken a soldier pill, or some new concoction he hadn't heard of that made her this powerful? He'd have to ask her once she reached him; he could make use of something like that.

As he expected, Sakura slowed down as she got closer to him, and stopped completely about a hundred yards away. The look of shock that had decorated her face at their last meeting was entirely absent this time, but that wasn't surprising as she'd been the one to track him down today.

"Your _chakra_ signature's changed," Sasuke said.

"No hello?" said Sakura. Her voice had changed too; it was much deeper than before. "That's terribly rude."

"Because I've always been so polite," Sasuke said. "What did you use to change your _chakra_ so much? A _jutsu_? A pill?"

"Aren't you curious," said Sakura dryly. "I'm not surprised; you always are when it comes to making yourself stronger, right?

"If you must know, I spent some time training just like you did." Sakura was smiling, and _trembling_ which surprised Sasuke a bit. He'd seen her tremble in fear many times, but he'd never seen her so excited about anything that it would make her shake. "I had to be sure I was ready to kill you for what you did to me."

Sasuke blinked. Of all the things he thought Sakura might say, that wasn't one he'd imagined in his wildest dreams. "You? _You're_ going to kill me?"

But he realized that she was serious by the way she was trembling, and by how wide and frightening her smile was. She'd wanted this, planned it, waited for it and now the thought of doing it made her excited enough to shake like there were insects under her skin. She really thought she could do this.

Sasuke drew _kusanagi_ from the sheath on his hip. If she wasn't going to tell him how she'd developed her _chakra_ or get out of his way, there was no point to letting her live—and if that thought pained Sasuke somewhere inside the remains of his soul, he didn't acknowledge the feeling.

"Even you can't be deluded enough to think that I'll go easy on you," he said.

Sakura laughed, and when the laughter died the look on her face would have been enough to scare almost anyone. "Oh, Sasuke. Who knows better than me just how cruel you can be?"

And with that, she leapt to attack.

* * *

She hated him. The demon didn't just dislike him, wasn't just disgusted by him, wasn't just annoyed by him; she _hated _him down to the very last hair on his head.

He was so stuck-up, wasn't he, so confident in his perfection. He looked at Sakura as though she was a little nothing irritation to be borne without grace. All the rest of the humans scurrying along beside him were little ants, little jokes who could never possibly be as high and mighty as he was.

_You're annoying._

How dare he? How dare he think that the love of another was something to be shattered with cruel words and thrown away? How dare he think of Sakura as beneath him when she had more compassion and humanity in her little finger than he would have been capable of even if his family hadn't been killed?

Bastard!

The demon who Sakura called "Auntie" thought all of these things, and felt the hatred and rage and pain that already existed in Sakura's mind bleed into her until they became her own. She let them, and gloried in the power that they gave her. She would show this boy, this little snot, this arrogant upstart just how pitiful he really was, would show him and shove his perfect upturned nose in it!

_You're annoying._

There was no more painful memory in Sakura's head than Sasuke's harsh parting words to her when he left to join Orochimaru. The demon felt her gaze begin to narrow and redden, focusing in on Sasuke's unmoving, posturing form. She saw him through a haze of scarlet hate, a film of pure rage that covered her and sunk into her soul.

_You're annoying._

He would die. Oh yes.

* * *

Sasuke wasn't too surprised when Sakura launched herself at him like a hungry wolf. She had, after all, proven before that she was willing to attack him. He was sure that her abilities were no more impressive now then they had been three years ago, but the willingness was there.

No, what surprised Sasuke was the sound she made.

Coul any human make such a noise? It was a yowling screech, a cry of hatred so concentrated and pure that Sasuke could not help but be taken aback. He felt such hatred every day of his life, and had for about eight years, but hearing that cry was almost frightening.

And what could make pampered, timid Sakura hate so strongly?

Sasuke raised his right arm and blocked the blow that was aimed for his head, and readied himself to leap back to give himself more room to maneuver.

He never got the chance. To his utter astonishment, Sakura's blow smashed right through his guard, breaking his arm and sending him sprawling.

When did she grow that strong?

His right arm useless, Sasuke quickly drew his sword with his left as he rolled back. The pain this caused his right arm almost made him black out, but he endured—Uchihas did not faint.

Sasuke sent _chidori_ through _kusanagi _at Sakura, and the blue light struck with enough force to send the girl reeling back. Sakura fell back onto hard, sharp rocks, her front covered with horrible burns from Sasuke's _jutsu_, her back punctured in a dozen places.

Sasuke lowered his sword, but didn't sheathe it. How had Sakura become so powerful? Was it some _jutsu_ that she'd had learned? Was that why her _chakra_ had felt so strange, because she'd learned such new, powerful techniques? But that wouldn't explain why she came after him alone or why she spoke in such a strange way.

Sasuke entertained the possibility that she might be possessed. It would explain the strange speech, the uncharacteristic habits and the new strength. But what had possessed her and why?

Sasuke again grew irritated with himself. Her death wouldn't matter—why would it? This girl was a nuisance, and always had been. Here was his chance—she was helpless before him, if he killed her she'd be out of his hair for good, and whatever was possessing her (if indeed something was) would die with her.His expression stoic, his limbs steady, Sasuke readied his sword and steeled himself for what he was about to do.

He never got beyond that. Before he could even move Sakura was sitting up, making wet sucking noises as rocks slid out of her back.

"Ow," she said, smirking at him. Without a trace of shame, she grabbed the zipper at her neck and pulled it down, revealing her chest and torso—and the quickly healing burns on them.

Sasuke couldn't help but be impressed. That was incredible healing power.

Of course, it also meant that he was in trouble.

* * *

Ten minutes later, Sasuke seriously began to consider retreating.

He just couldn't seem to get the upper hand. Sakura was splitting the ground asunder with her punches and effortlessly lifting rocks as big as she was over her head to throw at him. Sasuke couldn't even get near her when he was dodging horribly accurate projectiles and the ground kept disappearing out from under him!

Worse yet was his broken arm. He hadn't been in so much pain since being branded by Orochimaru. When anything so much as brushed up against it Sasuke would see stars and feel positively ill. How could he strike out at Sakura when sudden movements almost robbed him of consciousness?

Worst of all was how quickly Sakura healed. The few hits Sasuke did manage to land vanished so quickly that he might as well have not made them at all. And didn't she know it—Sakura stood before him sneering and gloating, lording his helplessness over him like some sort of schoolyard bully.

The very idea that pampered, coddled Sakura, who couldn't hit a target nine throws out of ten with a _kunai_, could have become this powerful in the few years Sasuke had been gone was mind-boggling. Even stranger was her cruelty; Sakura had many faults, but she had never been mean, she had never been violent, and even when she tried to attack him mere months ago she hadn't shown any sign of pleasure.

Sasuke again wondered if she was possessed. That theory was making more and more sense. And, of course, there were Naruto's parting words: "Danger...Sakura-chan is..." But in that case, why would the possessor come after him?

Perhaps because of his ability. He was, after all, Uchiha Sasuke, last of the genius Uchiha line and a deeply impressive warrior. Whatever was attacking him had probably heard of his considerable skill and wanted to challenge him.

The truly frustrating part of all this was that Sasuke knew he could take this attacker on if it weren't for his goddamn broken arm! If he had just leapt back instead of blocking "Sakura's" opening blow, he'd be more than a match. It was that first attack that had ruined it for him.

And it had been ruined. Humiliating as it was, Sasuke knew he was going to have to accept that and retreat or die and never have his revenge against Itachi, which was unacceptable.

It was then that "Sakura" threw a stone the size of a soccer ball at Sasuke's head. It made a spectacular collision with his eye and sent him reeling back, almost vomiting with pain. It was no difficult acting job to lay still and shallow his breathing.

"Sakura" gave a screaming cry of triumph and ran towards Sasuke so hastily that any doubts he'd had about her possession were erased. Sakura's only virtue on the battlefield was her intelligence; she would never be stupid enough to leave herself so open when coming up to a dangerous enemy.

She was talking, he realized, rambling like a madwoman. _You bastard, you stupid fucker, you loser, you pathetic pile of nothing! This is what you get, this is your fault, all your fault for acting like the love of another human being was worthless, your fault for your cruelty and arrogance and betrayal! Oh yes, you slimy, motherfucking beast, you rotten pile of shit how dare you, how dare you hurt me that way, how dare you take me for granted and treat me so coldly, how dare you exist when you have no right!  
_  
Sasuke was beyond confused. Was this Sakura, then? Was he wrong? It sounded like Sakura talking, except that he couldn't believe the Sakura he knew would ever say the things he was hearing!

But then Sakura was grabbing onto his hair and yanking him up off the ground, and there was no more time to think about it. He'd have to find his answers another time—for now he had to take advantage of Sakura assuming he was helpless just as she had taken advantage of him assuming the same.

Sasuke swung his unbroken arm around and grabbed onto Sakura's pale face, crying "_CHIDORI_!"

Sakura screamed in agony as her eyes went blind and the flesh burned right off of her face. She released Sasuke and stumbled backwards like a drunkard, clawing at her face in a panicked attempt to stop the pain.

Sasuke righted himself, face as cool as ever, and straightened his ruined clothing as best he could. He grabbed his sword from off the ground and slid it home into its sheath before turning his back on the howling _kunoichi_ and walking back to where he'd left Team Seven scattered in the dirt. If there were answers to be found, they'd have them.

In later years, it would occur to Sasuke that with Sakura as helpless as she had been in that moment, he could have killed her. He would brush this revelation aside as weak and pointless, and try to avoid questioning just why he hadn't taken the chance he'd bought himself.

He would fail, of course.

* * *

And so, Sasuke retraced his steps back to where he'd left his unconscious comrades. Finding them gone, it was easy enough to track them by the very obvious trail of debris and trodden ground they'd left in their wake. Having to rescue them was a bother, but it was reassuring to know that he was still so much more powerful than Konoha's other ninja. He'd been worried after that last fight.

It was about an hour before Naruto managed to catch Sasuke up on what was going on. Sasuke did not once speak, did not once change the expression on his face as he was told about cutting and possession and the eminent destruction of Sakura's soul. He sat calmly in front of Naruto and let the blond talk, sitting as straight and still as a marble statue.

While he listened Team Ten busied themselves treating the last of Kakashi and Sai's wounds. Kakashi was conscious and moving about by the time Naruto finished his story with a, "And then you came back and got rid of alla those demons."

Kakashi was examining Sasuke from the side. "Ino, do you have any chakra left?"

"Not much, but I can give a little more," she said. "Do you hurt somewhere?"

"No, but Sasuke's arm is broken. Got enough to heal him?" Kakashi asked.

Ino threw Kakashi an incredulous look. "Are you joking? I'm not healing him."

Kakashi turned to look at her, surprised, though Sasuke didn't seem particularly bothered by her words. "Healing is your duty, Ino."

"Healing the ninja of Konoha is my duty," said Ino. "I've got no power to spare for a traitorous little rodent."

Kakashi's eyes narrowed and he turned to fully look at his impromptu teammate. "It's a good thing I'm not asking for your opinion, then. Heal him. Now."

Chouji and Shikamaru gave simultaneous grimaces. This was not good. Ino was not the type to do as she was told—indeed, she had never hesitated to give Asuma a piece of her mind even when he was in a rage, and the way she was tossing her hair in a show of attitude now proved that she wasn't about to back down. But Kakashi was a man who expected to have his orders followed, and neither Chouji nor Shikamaru knew what he was apt to do if Ino kept defying him.

"No," said Ino. She put her hands on her hips and met Kakashi's eye with her own blue gaze. Her message was clear: make me!

"All of this is going into my report to the _Hokage_," said Kakashi. "You are going to be doing fifty thousand extra laps around Konoha with Guy strapped to your back so help me!"

Ino gave a scream of mirthless laughter that froze everyone; this level of disrespect was rare even for her. "Appealing to mommy to punish the bad little girl, Kakashi-sensei? I'm sure I would be in trouble if it were a real person I'm leaving to die of infection, but this is a disgusting little piece of _slime_, a traitorous cockroach that no one except _this_ idiot—" Ino thrust one bloodied hand in Naruto's direction, "—Wants back in Konoha! If he dies here it'll save ANBU the trouble of killing him later, and good riddance! And Tsunade-sama knows it too!"

Naruto was on his feet at this point, his wounds already healed by the _kyuubi_ inside him. "Shut up, Ino! You don't know anything!"

"I know what he did to Sakura," Ino snapped. "I know he thinks he's the only one on earth who's ever suffered, and that he thinks it gives him the right to treat people like shit."

"Enough," Shikamaru cut in, putting one hand down on Ino's shoulder. "Ino, that's enough. You're way out of line."

Ino rolled her eyes, but backed down from her aggressive position. "Whatever. If I'm the only one with the guts to say it, that can't be helped. But I don't care, I'm not healing him." Her head held high, Ino marched away from the group. Her teammates followed her.

Naruto and Kakashi seemed much more upset by this exchange than Sasuke, Sai noted with interest. During the entire argument Sasuke hadn't said a word, but instead busied himself forming a series of one-handed signs for a _jutsu_ of some kind with his working hand. With a grunt, he pressed said hand into his broken right arm; there was a flash and a cracking sound.

Naruto spun around. "Holy shit! What did you just do?"

"Healed my arm," said Sasuke, waving about the newly fixed right arm to make sure everything was where it should be. He knew about a half-dozen healing _jutsu_, but he rarely used them and didn't have the confidence with them that he did with battle _jutsu._ He was pleased to see how well he'd done, since he might need it later. Kabuto was obviously no longer around to heal those wounds and he had to rely on his own power.

Naruto gaped. "You can do that?"

Sasuke spared him a contemptuous look before standing up and starting to walk away.

"Where do you think you're going?" asked Kakashi in his Teacher Voice.

Sasuke didn't bother to answer, but continued on his way until Sai blocked his path.

Sai smiled, automatically going back to the fake smile he had learned before joining Team Seven. "May I suggest that it would be to your benefit to help us save Sakura?"

"No, you may not," said Sasuke, brushing past Sai.

"She already wiped the floor with you once," said Kakashi. Sasuke had not told them this, but his bruised state spoke for itself. "She'll find you and do it again. You stand a much better chance fighting with us."

Sasuke's wounded pride forced him to stop and respond. "She caught me by surprise, that's all. It won't happen again."

"What if it does?" said Kakashi. "We don't know just what this demon can do, and it might not have showed you everything in just one fight. We do know that it's going to get more and more powerful as it grabs control of Sakura's mind and body, and we can guess that these things—" Kakashi gestured at the fallen demons, "—are its friends. Who knows what else it can call up?"

"Yeah, yeah!" Naruto chimed in, thrusting a finger at Sasuke's stationary back. "First when it fought us, we beat it. But then it fought a group of ANBU, and it beat them! That was just a few hours different, and she'd gotten that much stronger! Then she comes out and beats you less than a day later! Wha'dyou think she's gonna be able to do by tomorrow? A week from now? You'll never get your revenge if you're killed here, bastard!"

Sasuke paused for another moment before turning around to meet Naruto's eyes. "You realize we might have to kill her. If she gets too powerful to be knocked out or captured, there might not be another choice."

Naruto narrowed his eyes. "That's really not an option."

"Then we really can't work together," said Sasuke, turning again.

"Sasuke, we're going to be working together whether we like it or not," said Kakashi. "She's going to go after you again, and since we're going to keep chasing her we're all going to wind up in the same place in the end."

"And besides," Sai pointed out, "_You're_ the one with the power to go into people's heads, aren't you? If we set her up so you can go into her head, we can both get our way—you can kill the demon inside of her and we can get Sakura back alive."

There was a long silence as everyone digested this suggestion.

"That's kind of brilliant," Naruto said.

Sai smiled. "I know."

* * *

_Sakura was buried in Auntie like an unborn child awaiting not life, but death in the womb. Her Auntie's love wrapped her up and comforted her, assuring her that she was loved and cherished, that never again would she be harmed by the cruel world and its uncaring inhabitants._

_The small part of Sakura's soul that realized she was being used and slowly killed rebelled, railing at the injustice of her capture. _You don't love me_, she silently screamed, you're eating me like I'm some kind of dessert, you're murdering me!_

Don't be silly_, the reply would come, _don't be dramatic; all of this is for your own good!

You murdering the people I love could never be for my own good!

They don't love you! _Was the reply. _No one who loves you would call you annoying! No one who loves you would call you disgusting!

_But was that true?_

_Sakura thought about that a lot; thinking was all she could do in the prison her body had become. She thought about Sai and how she had used him to slake her masochistic lust. She thought about Ino and regretted how she'd hurt the other girl when their minds connected. But mostly, she thought about Naruto._

_Sakura's will had been broken and crushed, her mind bent far beyond the limits it could safely go to. She had no belief in herself or her future, no belief in her worthiness as a _kunoichi _or as a woman. But somewhere deep inside her heart was the belief that Naruto loved her, and neither Auntie nor her own self-doubt could take that belief from her._

_How could that be? He had told her she was sick! He had seen her doing terrible things—how could he love her now?_

_But he did. Sakura didn't need to see Naruto to _know_ that he did, and any words he'd said in the heat of the moment had no bearing on that love. Naruto's words had wounded her deeply, and it would be a long time before she could look at his face without feeling the hurt he had caused her. But even now, even lost in the clutches of a powerful demon and guilty of committing acts with Sai that left her feeling vile, even now she knew that Naruto would never abandon her. If the whole world turned against her, he would still be by her side._

_So it didn't matter that Auntie was railing at her and telling Sakura that she had no friend but her. It didn't matter that Sakura hated herself, because Naruto would never hate her._

_Naruto would come for her. It was just a matter of time._

* * *

A/N

Poor Sasuke-kun! I love Team Seven and look what I'm putting them through in this story…sigh…I have to write a happy fluffy fic after this.

Okay, raise your hand if you think Sakura is really as pure and Sasuke really as evil as Auntie makes them out to be. Yeah, right!


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: If I owned it, I wouldn't be writing fan fiction!

Warnings: Language and discussion about sex.

Finding Sakura

Chapter Seven

By Michiru's Mirror

* * *

In Sai's opinion, Naruto's attempt to engage Sasuke in conversation was doomed, but admirable in its own way. Here Naruto was, terrified for Sakura's fate, and _still_ he tried to bring Sasuke around with some friendly talk.

"Hey, Uchiha! Did you choose that outfit yourself or did Orochimaru want the best view of your lovely shaved chest possible while you sucked him off?"

In the old days that probably would have been a cue for an answering round of Sasuke's wit, but that was then and this was now. He barely spared Naruto a glance before turning his back and walking away. Granted, there weren't many places to go, but the message was clear.

About an hour ago, Ino had scouted out the lair of Orochimaru's that Sasuke had just destroyed and determined that Sakura wasn't anywhere around, Teams Seven and Ten returned to it for the limited cover it could offer. Then it was Ino and Kakashi's job to go and find Sakura; they couldn't save her until they knew where she was.

Unfortunately, this left everyone else behind with nothing to do but wait in the destroyed and dusty corridors that used to house a madman and his slaves.

After Sasuke left, Naruto made no attempt to follow. His shoulders drooping with exhaustion, Naruto almost collapsed onto a crumbled piece of wall as though his legs couldn't support him anymore.

Sai stared at his teammate for a moment, observing the defeat written into every line of Naruto's face. He again had to wonder what about connections made so much pain worth it.

Well, there was no doubt that Naruto found it worth it in Sasuke's case. Though Sai couldn't understand why, everything Naruto had been through made it clear that his feelings for Sasuke ran deep. Was that why Naruto had been so passionate about this mission, Sai wondered, because he was determined to protect Sasuke from Demon Sakura?

No…the way Naruto refused Sasuke's assertion that Sakura might have to be killed, and his anger at Sai copulating with her, made it clear that Naruto had some feeling for her as well. Sai had always known that, but he wondered if it was the same type of feeling he had for Sasuke. Sai didn't think so, because Naruto treated the two of them so differently. If he had the same feelings for Sakura as he did for Sasuke, wouldn't he treat them the same way?

"Are you in love with her?" he asked Naruto. If Naruto's feelings for Sakura were romantic, it would explain the different treatment he gave Sasuke and Sakura.

The glare he got from Naruto would have been scary, had Naruto the energy to back it up. "_What_?"

"Are you in love with her," Sai repeated.

Naruto bristled, and for a moment Sai thought the other man was going to rally the strength to hit him after all. But then Naruto folded in on himself, sagging down as though all the fight had been sucked away from him. "Yes," he said.

Sai waited for elaboration, but none came. That was no good—he hadn't learned anything!

"Well," said Sai thoughtfully, "Then if Sakura had asked you to fuck her like she asked me to, would you have done it?"

Naruto looked like he'd been hit over the head. "Wh—wh—NO!"

Sai was growing more confused. "I thought when a man loved a woman, he was supposed to want her."

"Oh _shit_ Sai!" Naruto bent over and put his head in his hands as though he had a terrible migraine. "What is the _matter_ with you? Why can't you understand that questions like this are not okay to ask?"

"Well, why not?" said Sai. "What's so wrong with everything I do? Why is it that when I try to address people in a friendly way they get angry at me?" Naruto looked up in astonishment; Sai's voice was rising with almost every word he spoke, and there was a trace of a scowl on his pale features. "Why, when I try to get close to you and Sakura, am I interfering? Why, when I give Sakura what she asked for, can't I ask why it's wrong? How am I supposed to learn to do _anything_ right if no one will tell me anything except that I'm always wrong, wrong, wrong!"

A great deal of emotion was building inside of him, Sai realized, and he didn't like it. Everything was negative now. Joining Team Seven led him to feel more positive then he had in a long time, with memories of his brother and budding friendships with his teammates. But if this was how it all ended up, it wasn't worth it!

The frustration and helplessness boiled in Sai's stomach like poison, making him feel sick. Straightening himself up and forcing his face back under control, he was about to take his leave when Naruto spoke.

"If Sakura-chan had come to me asking me to hurt her, I'd have taken her to the hospital, or tried to talk to her about why she was feeling so fucked up. That's why she didn't come to me," Naruto said. "She probably went to you, 'cause she knew you don't know any better. And…"

Naruto looked up, but couldn't meet Sai's eyes. "And I know you don't know any better either. It's not…fair…to take it out on you, and I was wrong."

Sai thought about that, and felt the pain in his belly lessen a bit. "Kakashi-sensei said that people were mad at me because I'm a convenient scapegoat."

"Yeah." Naruto smiled sadly, leaning back now and supporting himself on his hands. "This is the shit part about loving someone; when they hurt, you hurt too, and it can make you act like a real moron." And then Naruto was gripping the wall so hard his knuckles were turning white and clenching his jaw painfully tight.

"Fuck," he said. "What do I do if she dies?"

"I don't know," said Sai, because he didn't.

Naruto had a look of such despair on his usually jovial features that Sai felt awkward for almost the first time in his life. There was no way he could even begin to understand the pain in Naruto's heart, so what could he possibly say to comfort him? I'm sorry? I know how you feel? I'll do whatever you need to help? It all sounded wrong and worse, presumptuous. If there was ever a time for delicate speech it was now, and Sai was very aware that he couldn't provide it.

So he walked away instead.

* * *

For a few minutes, he allowed himself the luxury of not thinking about a thing. He wandered over fallen stones and through nearly-caved-in hallways and let his mind drift. How had Orochimaru built this place, he wondered? Did he want it for defense, or for research, or was this perhaps a home to relax in?

Sai had a hard time imagining anyone relaxing in this dank, moldy, cockroach infested place, but maybe Orochimaru had just had different standards.

But Sai found he couldn't keep his brain off of what he'd just heard for long. He deeply appreciated Naruto's apology, but more, he appreciated Naruto's explanation on "the shit part of loving someone."

Things were beginning to make a kind of sense. If you loved someone it brought feelings of protectiveness and possessiveness, and joy as well—Sai remembered a shadow of that joy in himself when his brother lived. But the tradeoff was that if the other person got hurt, you in turn suffered, just like Naruto said. Furthermore, there was an irrational side that a person developed where their loved ones were concerned.

Sai's thoughts turned to Sasuke, to how he'd said he'd broken his bonds because he understood the strength of them. Sai understood his meaning: Sasuke had decided that worry and protective feelings simply weren't worth it. Or maybe that was his reasoning. By now, Sai knew better than to assume anything involving emotions.

Besides, since Sai was himself wondering if connections were worth it, it was entirely possible that he was projecting his own thoughts onto Sasuke.

Well, there was only one way to find out. Sai retraced his steps and then followed the path Sasuke had taken. He was not surprised to see that Sasuke hadn't gone far. After all, he needed to stay close to hear Ino or Kakashi when they came back, and he just needed to turn his back and duck out of sight to make his point to Naruto. Sasuke was sitting on one of the crumbled walls like Naruto had been, though he did it with considerably more grace and poise.

Sasuke spoke as soon as Sai was in hearing range, though he made no other move to acknowledge the other boy's presence. "Sakura's not as sweet as Naruto thinks she is, you know."

Sai crossed his arms and rested against another wall. "You have no feelings for her, then?"

Sasuke smirked and tilted his head towards Sai. "Why do you ask? Are you in love with her too? First Naruto, then Lee, and now you?"

Sai considered Sasuke's amused face. Did it mean anything that he wouldn't answer the question? It could mean that he hated her; his saying that Sakura wasn't very sweet would bear that out. Or it could mean that he was still trying to break his bonds with his old team and didn't want to say anything that might show lingering affection.

He simply couldn't tell. Try as he might, Sai couldn't read Sasuke's expression at all.

"No," he answered finally. "I don't think I am. But I trust her more than anyone except Naruto. She always tells me the truth, and she's the only one patient enough to explain things to me when I get confused." Sai tilted his head back and thought. "Also, I enjoy her company. She doesn't yell at me for no reason or call me strange unless I've really done something wrong."

"The truth?" said Sasuke. "Like she told you the truth when she got you to cut her? Face it, she took advantage of you, just like she does everybody else."

Sai frowned in confusion. "Took advantage of me?"

"You know, getting you to cut her up because anyone else would have known something was wrong. She knew you didn't know any better, and knew you trusted her, and used that to get you to do her the way she wanted."

Sai mulled over that. It was true that she hadn't come to him for affection, and that she had known how inexperienced he was in matters of sex and human relations. "That's quite possible," he said. There was a slight pain in his chest at the admission, a pressure that Sai didn't like.

Instead of dwelling on it, he tried to change the topic. "If 'anyone else would have known,' then what about you? You don't seem to mind hurting her, so if she had come to you asking you to do that to her, would you have?"

"Of course not," said Sasuke, as though the very idea was ridiculous.

"Because you would have realized something was wrong with her?"

"Because I have no interest in sex as it takes up too much energy and time, and no interest in Sakura in general. Particularly not when she's dealing with deep, traumatic emotional issues. I have to focus on my brother."

"So, you would have been happy to let Sakura destroy herself in front of you…you just wouldn't want to be part of what destroyed her because you 'wouldn't want to waste the energy.'"

"That's about it," said Sasuke.

"I see," said Sai. "So you broke your connections with Naruto and Sakura not to spare yourself the pain of worrying, but instead because you don't want to waste energy on them."

"Basically," said Sasuke, "And I suggest you do the same. Wasting time on overly emotional people like that idiot Naruto gets in the way of everything, from your logic to your fighting skills."

"I was just thinking the same thing," said Sai. "I was talking to Naruto about Sakura, and thinking about how strongly his judgment has been impaired, and how hurt he is. I had to wonder if such strong feelings are worth the bother."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "And now you know for sure?"

"Yes," said Sai. "They _are_ worth it."

Sasuke's eyebrow went higher. "What makes you say that after the discussion we've just had?"

"That you say they aren't," said Sai. "I'm inexperienced at having friends, and I very obviously messed up badly this time around. But however low I fall, I know I don't want to go as low as you.

"If ever I needed more evidence that you are the most loathsome man ever produced by Fire Country, this conversation provided it. If giving up on my friends will make me like you, then I'd best do everything in my power to avoid that."

Turning his back, Sai walked away. He'd learned what he needed to know.

Sasuke impassively watched his replacement walk out of sight before leaning back and sighing. "Not quite," he said quietly. "However low I fall, there's still one man more loathsome than me."

* * *

Sai returned to Naruto feeling more clear-headed then he had since Sakura first came to his apartment.

He knew that his words often had the opposite effect of what he wanted, so he didn't bother to try and comfort Naruto verbally. Instead, he sat down near his teammate quietly and didn't say a word. If Naruto wanted to talk, he would listen. If Naruto just wanted silent support, he would do his best to provide that, too. This was a scary idea to Sai, because he hadn't read about it in any book nor gotten it from advice anyone had given him. It was instead one of the first ideas he'd ever had that came from his own experience, and there was every possibility that it would backfire…but it was the best he had to offer.

When Naruto looked up and gave Sai a wan smile, Sai nodded back. Maybe he was finally doing something right.

* * *

It was another half hour of companiable silence before Ino returned to her body, her face flushed from exertion. At this point she was so worn out that Chouji had to carry her back to the lair.

Naruto grimaced at the state of her. "I guess it'd be stupid to ask if you're okay."

Ino gave him a look. "Pretty stupid, yeah."

"Then can I ask if you found her?" Naruto said.

Ino sighed and dropped her gaze. "No…I'm sorry. But those stupid demons are everywhere! Some of 'em are getting closer to this place, too. We should probably move within the next hour or they might find us."

"What should we do if Kakashi-sensei isn't back in time?" asked Sai. His old training instructed him to leave their commander behind, but Sai didn't think for a minute that anyone in this group except Sasuke would like that idea.

"No need to worry about that," said a voice from behind the group; everyone jumped and swiveled around to see Kakashi's amused face. "I have arrived…and you people need to work on sensing chakra, especially when you're in the middle of a hostile environment." Cheerful as his tone was, the assembled ninja knew when they'd been put in their place. There was a collective hanging of heads.

Sasuke, obviously paying better attention than the rest of them, returned from where he'd sequestered himself at that moment.

"Anyway," said Kakashi, nodding a greeting to Sasuke, "I've spotted her, and we need to hurry, because a lot of those demons are forming on her. We're facing a small army."

"Then we'll need reinforcements," said Shikamaru. "Ino is as good as out and I couldn't hurt the things a bit last time we fought."

"We can't wait for them, though!" interjected Naruto. "That stupid demon keeps getting stronger, and anyway what about Sakura-chan? She's in trouble _now_!"

"I agree," said Kakashi. "We don't know if we're on a time limit of some kind, and it's best not to find out. The situation is much better than it was last time anyway. Everyone is conscious, for a start."

Kakashi turned to Shikamaru and Ino. "But you're right, we need more people, and you two are no good. Ino can't do anything when she can't stand up, and Shikamaru, your brain is too valuable to waste in a fight where you can't do much anyway. Go home, and tell the Hokage we need help. In the meantime, we're going to launch our attack." Ino looked like she wanted to protest, but Shikamaru held up his hand and gave her a stern look.

Ino looked like she'd swallowed a lemon, but she backed down.

Kakashi adjusted his _hitai-ate_ above his eye, and said, "Okay: here's the plan. Sai, some of my _ninken_ are coming back now with the art supplies that got scattered last fight, so you're in.

"This is a really simple strategy. We're going to mask our _chakra_, sneak up on them, and attack. I'm going first with a _raikiri_ to scatter the demons, since Sasuke proved that's effective, and then everyone except Sasuke is going to form around Sakura. We keep the demons away from her, and that's going to be Sasuke's cue to jump into her head, while we four—" Kakashi gestured vaguely at himself, Naruto, Sai and Chouji "—keep the demons away.

"Questions?"

* * *

A/N

So now we have two opinions of Sakura: Auntie's opinion is that she's super-pure and compassionate, and Sasuke's that she's a manipulative bitch. Hmm…

Dang, I forgot to mention this last time: thanks to **blckfirekllr** for the great criticism they gave me in chapter 5 (specifically that chapter one had great drama, but later chapters had gone a bit downhill since I was focusing more on action). That's a good point. Just because I love action doesn't mean I should let character development drop by the wayside. I'm proud of what I did with Sai in Chapter Four, but Chapter Five only had a bit of characterization in it, yeah? The important part was the return of Sasuke, so I was trying to give him a big lead-in, and if I didn't do a good job of it I always appreciate being told. Rest assured: what Sakura did (under the influence of a demon though she may have been) and what Naruto said will be dealt with. We just have to save Sakura's life first.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: If I owned it, I wouldn't be writing fan fiction!

Warnings: Language, and some slightly disturbing imagery.

Finding Sakura

Chapter Eight

By Michiru's Mirror

* * *

_Sasuke hadn't been to Konoha in a good three years, but he still remembered the hospital. God knew he'd spent enough time in it, thank's to Orochimaru's cursed seal and Itachi's_ tsukiyomi.

_But it wasn't the place he'd known. It looked the same with unnaturally clean and sterilized walls, silver trays holding instruments of torture masquerading as instruments of healing, large counters behind which nurses were supposed to sit. Yet the feeling was all wrong—it was as though he'd just stepped into a_ genjutsu.

_Well, he supposed that stepping into Sakura's mind was similar. It was no longer the "real" world, but one that she had created, just as all people did. He hadn't expected this because when he had gone into Naruto's mind months ago everything had been straightforward and easy to find and understand. Sakura's mind was obviously a little more complex._

_That made sense. Naruto was a straight thinking kind of guy, so his mind would naturally be simpler than the mind of someone who ate textbooks whole like Sakura._

_The hallway Sasuke walked down was empty, until suddenly it wasn't; there behind the counter was a woman who looked so much like Sakura that for a moment Sasuke was sure it was her._

_Walking up to the counter he saw that it was indeed Sakura—sort of. On her forehead was written_ Uchi Naru _Sakura, whatever that was supposed to mean._

_He might as well play along. "I'm here to see Haruno Sakura."_

Uchi Naru _Sakura gave Sasuke a disapproving look. "Haruno-san is not accepting visitors right now."_

_"She'll see me."_

_"She's not seeing anyone."_

_"It's about her health," Sasuke said, getting a bit frustrated._

_"Her health is best left to the professionals," said_ Uchi Naru_ Sakura. "Please leave."_

_"No," said Sasuke._

Uchi Naru _Sakura blinked up at him, flabbergasted. "What did you say?"_

_"You heard me." Sasuke was walking past the counter before_ Uchi Naru _Sakura could say a word, moving to the doors that lined the hallway past the counter. If Sakura was there, he would find her._

_The first door he came to had a label pasted right in the center: Uzumaki Naruto._

_Sasuke frowned. That didn't make any sense. He was inside of Sakura's mind—why would Naruto be here?_

_One way to find out._

_Reaching out with his left hand and getting a firm grip on_ kusanagi _with his right (just in case), Sasuke opened the door._

_It was a patient room, with the standard two beds, privacy curtains and TV hanging from the top left corner. Naruto was nowhere in it. Sasuke entered cautiously, being sure to check his blind spot and keep hold of_ kusanagi, _but there was no one_.

_Aside from there being no people, the only things that looked remotely out of place were the large file cabinets stuffed to overflowing with patient reports. Curious, Sasuke walked over to the closed file cabinet, which was labeled IRRITATION. He opened the top drawer and found that the files were organized by date._

_Sasuke pulled out a file and saw that it recorded an incident from three years prior to the forming of Team Seven. It turned out to be a standard patient incident form, but it wasn't filled out like any he'd ever seen._

_PROBLEM  
At 3:30 pm Uzumaki Naruto, hereafter referred to as the patient, snuck up behind one Haruno Sakura and pulled her hair. Before Haruno could respond, the patient had run away, crying "I LOVE YOU!" behind his shoulder._

_DIAGNOSIS  
The patient has a severe and deeply annoying infatuation with Haruno._

_TREATMENT  
Hit repeatedly on the head until he goes away._

_A slight, reminiscent smile spread across Sasuke's face before he could stop it. Oh yeah, he remembered that—he had done that sort of thing too, until the massacre of the Uchiha clan had wiped any interest in romance from him. Sasuke supposed he should be grateful that in the three years between this incident and the formation of Team Seven Naruto had realized that hair-pulling and mud-slinging were not very effective techniques at getting a girl to notice you. He could just imagine the team dynamics if Sakura had found Naruto__even more bothersome than she already had._

_He replaced the file where he had found it, and took a look at the cabinet next to it. COOL AND MANLY, it was labeled. To his amusement, Sasuke realized this one was almost empty._

_Next to that was a cabinet labeled FRIENDSHIP, and beside that was one labeled ROMANCE. Sasuke raised an eyebrow at those. Interestingly enough, files from these two cabinets were a mess, as though someone kept moving files back and forth between them haphazardly. It was as though the person filing wasn't sure where the files on friendship ended, and the ones on romance began._

_Sasuke had to repress another grin. For such a smart person, Sakura could be remarkably stupid, especially when it came to her own feelings._

_This was dangerous territory, Sasuke realized. A strong wave of fondness was sweeping through him, and whether it was his own feeling or something he was picking up from Sakura, he had to fight it. He had dedicated himself to becoming more than this, and couldn't let himself be brought down by a few sappy memories. Swiftly, Sasuke turned and walked out the door._

* * *

_ Each room was labeled, and Sasuke was not surprised to see his own name on the very next door. He did not go inside. He did not want to see what memories, thoughts and "treatments" Sakura had saved into her head. Whether he was worried about becoming weak or worried about seeing what Sakura really thought of him, he wasn't sure._

_After UCHIHA SASUKE came SAI, and then HATAKE KAKASHI. Sasuke didn't read any of the files in these rooms, but he checked in each to make sure that they were the same setup as Naruto's: abandoned beds and stuffed file cabinets. They were._

_Then, eventually, there was HARUNO AKIHIRO—Sakura's father, obviously—HARUNO KYOKO, and HARUNO SAKURA._

_If he was going to find out where Sakura was, the files in her room might give him some clues. The_ Uchi Naru _Sakura up front might not be willing to tell him what he wanted to know, but as long as Sakura wasn't deleting or destroying her own memories (or having them destroyed by the demon inside of her), things could be written down in the file cabinets._

_Sasuke unhesitatingly grabbed the doorknob to Sakura's room and pulled it open, expecting to see beds and file cabinets once more. Thankfully he was well trained enough to not be paralyzed by the shock he felt at the very different sight that greeted him._

_It was a cavern, a stone archway stretching almost as high and as wide as his eye could see. Far in the back, almost a speck, was Sakura.  
_  
_Sasuke didn't hear the demon come up from behind him, but he could feel her nonetheless. Before the blade she held could chop off his head he moved through the door in a forward roll. Too late, he realized that had been the demon's plan; before he could turn around he heard the door slam behind him. He was trapped._

_But not alone. In the split second that it took him to draw_ kusanagi _and get on guard, he realized that the demon had entered the room with him. She stood now between him and the door._

_She was a beautiful young woman, perhaps in her early thirties with long wheat-gold hair piled on her head in a messy bun. In her gloved right hand was a sword as long as Sasuke's own, and she was holding it as though she knew how to use it._

_"Sasuke-kun!" she said, and her voice was warm and friendly, the voice his mother had. "Why, I never thought you'd come here in person."_

_"The demon, I presume," said Sasuke._

_"Yep," the demon said. _

_"Why are you doing this to Sakura?"_

_"It's a trade off," the demon said, showing no hesitation or shame. "All the dark, nasty little fantasies in her head and heart, all the terrible things buried in her subconscious that she refuses to even acknowledge—I brought them to life. People she wants to hurt, insecurities she wants to feed, types of pleasure she would never dare to seek out on her own. I've given them to her. I give people the twisted things they're too afraid to tell themselves they want, and if I get a meal from those same twisted feelings, well, no one can say I didn't pay for it!"  
_  
_She was stalking towards him slowly, sure that he was trapped and enjoying the moment. In response Sasuke tried to call his chakra to him—and found that he couldn't. Something in here was keeping him from his power, and he'd bet his_ sharingan _that it had something to do with the demon in front of him!_

_With no other defense available to him Sasuke went on the retreat, keeping_ kusanagi _between their two bodies and doing his best to keep his enemy talking. "You feed off of people's pain and shame? Your mother must be proud of you."_

_The demon threw back her head and roared with laughter, making Sasuke cringe. It was an unnatural, ugly sound that grated on him painfully. "Precocious scamp! Just like you always were!"_

_Sasuke's first impulse was to snap at her to stop acting like she knew anything about him...but really she _did_ know him, because she knew everything Sakura did, and who knew him better than she, except Itachi and Naruto?_

_He felt sick, violated thinking of private things the demon would have learned about him from Sakura. Things that she knew were not to be shared with anyone else! "So what happens when your victim has all these repressed dreams fulfilled, then?"_

_"Ah well, I've usually eaten a little too much of them for them to live, but they die with all their desires fulfilled, and isn't that the best way to die?"  
_  
_Sasuke took a quick glance behind himself. Sakura was much closer to him now, and what he saw of her sickened him further._

_She was naked and suspended by what looked like electronic wires that wove in and out of her flesh at random places; Sasuke didn't need to see where the cords went to know that they were taking what the demon needed out of her so it could feed. Sakura's skin sagged and her breasts drooped, her hair grayed in places and there was an unhealthy sallow tinge to her flesh as though she had aged thirty years._

_Worst of all was her face. Though her eyes were open, they didn't appear to see anything; a milky-white substance covered them like cataracts and her expression was vacant. A line of drool slid out of her parted lips to drip onto the ground in a steady flow._

_"No," Sasuke snapped to the demon. "If a junkie fights for twenty years to clean himself up, you're not doing him any favors by making him take another hit. Sakura is going to undergo ridicule after what you made her let Sai do to her!"_

_"She would undergo ridicule if she lived," the demon said. "That's why dying after wish fulfillment is best—you have fun, and no consequences! She'll get it both ways! How many people can really say that?"_

_"Live ones," Sasuke said. There was no more point to having this conversation. He could argue until he ran out of breath, but it wouldn't help Sakura any._

_New tactic._

_"SAKURA!" Sasuke roared, not taking his eyes off of the advancing demon before him. "Sakura, wake up! You have to take care of this filth!"_

_For a moment, there was nothing...and then Sakura spoke. Her voice was horribly weak, but somehow Sasuke could hear her as clearly as if she'd been yelling._

_"I'm sorry...I'm so sorry, Sasuke-kun..." She sounded beyond heartbreak. Hers was the voice of a person whose every hope had been abandoned._

_"I'm weak, Sasuke-kun. I've always been...I can't do this..."_

_Sasuke stiffened, his eyes widening in disbelieving rage at what he was hearing. Before him the demon smiled widely, the corners of her mouth stretching wider then a human mouth was meant to go. "You see, Sasuke-kun? She wants my help! Poor, sweet Sakura—she always supported Naruto quietly from the background, always agreed with everything you said and didwhatever you wanted because she loved you so. That's who she is, a kind girl who can do very little on her own."_

"...**What?**" _said Sasuke_.

* * *

Oblivious to the battle raging inside of Sakura's mind, Naruto, Chouji, Kakashi and Sai were holding their own.

Almost an hour ago Kakashi's plan had been put into action, and it had been as straightforward as it had sounded. The four of them had surrounded Sakura's body and began to blast away at demons while Sasuke leapt into the center of the square of protection they'd set up and activated his _sharingan_.

And then, they waited. They fought their way through a swamp of demon flesh and teeth and claws using _jutsu,_ weapons and fists. They lost track of time, space and each other, lost track of everything but the feel of flesh on flesh. Kakashi and Naruto had _jutsu_ that wiped out a dozen demons at a time, but for every one that fell another took its place.

They had to keep that space clear, had to leave Sasuke the space to work, or Sakura was lost to them.

Before the battle began, Naruto had gripped Sasuke hard on the shoulder and said, "I don't want it to be you who fights her."

Sasuke had considered being hostile; it would have been satisfying to see the look on Naruto's face had he said something like _fuck you _or _you wouldn't stand a chance, dead last_. But a belligerent Naruto could ruin the whole operation, so Sasuke decided to use logic.

"Even ignoring the fact that you don't have any way to get into her head and I do," said Sasuke leaning so close to Naruto that their noses almost touched, "Can you bring yourself to hit her?"

Naruto blinked. "What?"

"You heard me. I won't kill her if I don't have to, but you're dreaming if you think this fight is going to end without a few blows being exchanged. Even with your life on the line, do you think that you could ever, in your wildest dreams, bring yourself to raise your hand to her?"

"I..." Naruto trailed off, and that was answer enough.

Sasuke nodded. "Thought so. If you want to help, you need to be somewhere where you can do some good, and that's going to be against enemies you're willing to hit."

He had moved to walk forwards, but found his arm snagged once more. Biting his tongue to keep an irritated snarl from coming out, Sasuke turned back to see a tinge of red lining those familiar blue eyes.

"If she dies…" Naruto said, and then trailed off. Sasuke knew that Naruto had no idea of how to finish his sentence. His love for Sasuke was deep enough that Sasuke doubted the other boy would ever outright murder him. Still, there would doubtless be consequences should Sakura die...even if Naruto wasn't sure what they were yet.

Sasuke had no fear of Naruto, but he didn't doubt that the other boy was serious. And now, with Naruto fighting with all the strength he possessed to keep the space clear for him to work, Sasuke had thus far kept himself from touching Sakura physically. He had simply met her gaze, activated the _sharingan_, and let their two minds meet.

But now...

Kakashi, Chouji and Sai didn't notice what Sasuke did next. They were understandably devoting all of their concentration to the battle before them. Naruto tried to do the same, understanding that there was simply nothing he could do for Sakura except keep her body safe while Sasuke rooted the demon out of her head. But try as he might, he simply couldn't keep a part of his mind from focusing on the battle of wills happening just behind him, or keep his eyes from drifting back to the two people dearest to him in the world.

That was why he saw when Sasuke stiffened, walked over to Sakura, and slapped her so hard that blood spurted from her mouth.

* * *

_Inside the cavern, there was a tiny earthquake._

_The demon gaped at Sasuke for a moment, all decorum forgotten. "What—what did you just_ do _out there_?"

_Sasuke, not turning to Sakura but clearly addressing her, yelled, "Bullshit!_

_"Helpless? You? Who are you trying to fool? You're a bitch! You've always been a bitch! You might fool Naruto, but you've never fooled me!"_

_The demon stiffened and hissed, her hands gripping her sword so hard that the skin began to redden. "How dare you! You...you..." Her mouth opened and closed like a dying fish, her outrage at what she'd just heard rendering her speechless._

_Not for long. Before Sasuke could yell another insult, she had dropped her sword and raised her arms above her head. Though Sasuke could see nothing, he felt power grow between her hands. "And here I was going to give you the dignity of dying in battle. My mistake, I should have known you don't deserve it!_

_"Well, I've learned my lesson. This is a better death for you!"_

_The ground under Sasuke's feet shifted and changed, and though he tried to jump away he found himself rooted to the spot. Looking down, he saw why—solid stone had turned to tar that gripped at his feet and sucked him down little by little._

_Fuck!_

_Sasuke abandoned any caution he'd held on to up until now. "Sakura! God damn it, Sakura, you stupid brat, what are you doing just sitting there? I need your help! Naruto and Kakashi need your help! We can't stop this demon, but she's plugged into your head so you can!_

_"And don't you_ _dare tell me that you're not strong enough!" The tar had sucked him in almost to his thighs now. Sasuke hadn't been this emotional since confronting his brother three years ago, and prided himself on his control, but he knew that this was the end of the road for him. With his powers gone he had no control of what went on here—only Sakura did.  
_  
_How could he have lost control this way? He had learned to use and dominate other's minds, but somehow this one was different! Was it because the demon was curtailing his power, because of Sakura's own abilities, or was there another factor he simply hadn't counted on?_

_Whatever, Sasuke knew that if Sakura didn't snap out of it, he was dead right here. His revenge would never happen, and the Uchiha clan would end with him. The thought was so terrifying that it made Sasuke scream, made him tell the truth in a way he simply never had before. It was truth or the death of his life and his ambitions, and there could be nothing worse than that!_

_"Kind, sweet Sakura? Gentle Sakura? Don't make me laugh! You're the nastiest, bitchiest, toughest girl ever born in Konoha!" Sasuke struggled to turn around and face Sakura's grotesquely mauled body while he spoke. Maybe if she could see his face it would help._

_"What!" cried the demon behind him. "How could you say that? This is the Sakura who followed you around like a puppy and agreed with every word you said just to gain your attention!"_

_The tar was up to his waist now, but Sasuke smirked anyway at what he considered to be a ridiculous statement. "Sure, she followed me and did whatever I said—because she wanted to! Sakura, if you were really a puppy dog who did what you were ordered to do, you would have left me alone when I told you to! But you didn't, because that wasn't an order that you liked. You kept on my tail with all those annoying Sasuke-kun Sasuke-kun's, which is the _opposite _of what I wanted, and then expected me to believe that you were a weak, obedient girl! You stood up to my glares, my insults, to everything I threw at you, because that's what you wanted to do!_

_"And it's not just me, oh no. How about Naruto? I remember when he tried to tell you his deepest feelings and you just sniffed at him and walked away! On our first day as a team all he wanted was to sit next to you and you just rubbed in his face that you wanted to sit with me instead! Couldn't even wait until he was gone or say no politely, could you? No, not Haruno Sakura!_

_"Or Kakashi! I know all about how you decided he was an unsatisfactory teacher! You didn't say a word to him when you threw him over for Tsunade. He'd taken a year of his life showing you every trick he could, comforting you and pampering you when you pretended to be helpless, protecting you from harm, and you threw him away like garbage when he didn't suit your needs any longer! Did you even apologize? No, of course you didn't, all that mattered was that you get what you wanted like always!_

_"And Ino. Don't think I'm not aware of how your rivalry over me began. She had a crush on me and hid it, because she loved you and worried about your feelings. Then you found out that she had feelings for me, and it was _you _who threw_ her _aside! She'd saved you from bullies and taught you everything she knew and then even put you before her feelings for me. That would move most people, but not you! Not Haruno Sakura! No, all you thought about was what you wanted, and you tossed her aside without a second thought to pursue it after all she'd sacrificed for you! God, is it any wonder she was so aggressive towards you after that? I'd never heard of such cruelty until I met Orochimaru!  
_  
_"And now you're trying to tell me that you've become a girl so weak that she lets men slice her skin up and allows herself to be controlled by some pitiful, second-rate wannabe-vampire? I don't buy it for a minute! No one tells Haruno Sakura what to do! No one beats you and you know it!_

_"Your illusions of delicacy won't get me killed, Sakura! Wake up and be you, the bitch!"_

_The tar had reached Sasuke's chest by now, forcing him to hold his hands above his head to keep them from being sucked under. He was running out of time!_

_"Sakura!" he yelled, out of words to convince her and desperate to get through to her. "_SAKURA_!"_

_The demon was next to him then, raising her sword up high. Her beautiful face was twisting and changing, as though all the rage in her was coming out through her features. _

_The sword came down. Sasuke refused to close his eyes or look away. He did not want to die before Itachi was dead, but if this was where things ended then he wouldn't let himself go out bowing and scraping to a parasite that had hurt his dear friend._

_"She'll stop you," said Sasuke, the panic gone from his voice and replaced with certainty. "She's the strongest person I've ever met. Something will convince her that she doesn't want you here, and when it does you're dead."_

_The demon shrieked with fury and brought the sword down—and Sakura's hand caught it before it could touch Sasuke's head._

_She stood behind Sasuke now, bleeding and old but awake and alert, with the fire in her eyes that he knew so well. The tubes that had connected her body to the cave walls trailed behind her naked body, ripped from the walls and Sakura's own flesh when she'd torn herself free._

_And Sasuke realized that he wasn't surprised, because he'd meant every word of what he'd said. There was no one bitchier, and no one stronger, than Haruno Sakura. It seemed Sakura had made up her mind to save him, and so he was safe._

_Sakura's eyes were locked onto the face of the shocked demon, plainly spelling death as she uttered in a clear, strong voice made beautiful by conviction: "You're not welcome here." _

_Sasuke smiled._

* * *

A/N

The entire fic was based around this scene. I had it in my head for weeks before Monday's Dusk Noon finally gave me an idea for how to start the fic(great thanks once again to him). Finally getting to write it out was really awesome!

Before anyone asks, this is NOT a SasuSaku. But I am a big fan of the two of them as friends. They help each other out; Sakura is patient with Sasuke's faults in a way that no one else is, and Sasuke has NO patience with Sakura's faults, so he kicks her in the rear when no one else will. That can help both of them reach their potential.

The doors were in alphabetical order by the Japanese alphabet (which is why we didn't see Ino—she had a room too!).

Sakura has a mind stuffed with knowledge, and since I've never seen a computer in Naruto, I went with file cabinets to show that. I'm obliged to point out that Stephen King used the idea first in his fabulous _Dreamcatcher_ book. The idea was so perfect here I couldn't resist it.


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: I own Naruto. And I invented the toothpick. And I can fly…

Warnings: Language, violence, maybe some imagery for the more sensitive among you.

Finding Sakura

Chapter Nine

By Michiru's Mirror

* * *

_Sakura remembered now._

_The memory of that awful day had been going over and over again in her head like a video stuck on repeat. "You're annoying," was the cruelest of all the words Sasuke had ever spoken to her. The hurt had grown deeper each time Sakura was forced to relive it, and had gone so deep that she had forgotten the rest._

_But now she remembered. She remembered threatening to give Sasuke's position away. She remembered him appearing behind her._

_And she remembered that he had said, "Thank you."_

_Sakura understood clearly now that Sasuke loved her. He had never, and would never, love her in the way she had wanted him to, but he loved her nonetheless as a dear friend and teammate. Sakura's sixteen year old self understood what her twelve year old self hadn't been able to: that that friendship was precious, and every bit as deep as the romantic feelings she'd had for him. That friendship was for her, and it was the most important thing in the world._

_Sakura looked at the demon across from her and was disgusted. As she watched it began to grow old again, and she could feel her own skin firming as her youth and energy returned. Sasuke was right—she had started this, and she had to end it. Sasuke had called her names because she had allowed it, Sai had cut and fucked her because she had told him to, and now this demon had come into her mind because she had invited it._

"_You think you can get away with this?" Someone was speaking, and Sakura realized only much later that it was her._

"_You think you can do this to me, and get away with it?" Her hand hurt, she realized; she had caught a sword with her bare hand and it was bleeding dangerously. Not only her hand, either, for wires and tubes snaked beneath her flesh and invaded her body and made her bleed and bruise almost everywhere._

_But those pains were nothing to the suffering the demon before her had put her through in the past months. It was nothing to the suffering Sakura put _herself_ through for years with her doubts and tantrums and dependence. She _hurt_, and she was sick of hurting, and she was going to make the pain stop!_

_Auntie—no, this demon was no aunt of hers—was gaping and stuttering and going pale, and Sakura realized that Sasuke had been correct. The demon was tied into her now, a mosquito with its proboscis sunk deep inside of her, so deep it couldn't pull out even if she swatted it._

"_Sakura-chan!" the demon pleaded, holding out her free hand in entreaty. "Sakura-chan, don't make it sound like that, I only wanted to help you—"_

_Sakura laughed. "That argument held until you started planning my death."_

"_No, Sakura-chan, I'm only thinking of you!" There was such desperation on the demon's face that Sakura almost believed it in spite of herself. "I only want to give you what you want!"_

"_Who do you think you're talking to? Nobody tells me what I want!" Sakura's voice roared, echoing through the cavern. She remembered this willpower. This was good! _

_With her rapidly-returning strength Sakura pulled the sword out of the demon's grasp and tossed it aside. She reached down with her good hand to grab Sasuke by the collar of his shirt and pulled him up and out of the dark pool he'd been sinking into._

_She turned to face him despite the enemy across from her and was unsurprised to find Sasuke smiling at her more openly than she'd ever seen. She grinned back, not the simpering girly look she'd always given him as a child, but a strong smile full of the pride that he'd reminded her she always had. _

_There were so many things that Sakura wanted to say! But Sasuke had never been a man of words, and declarations of friendship now would go over as well as the proclamations of love she had drowned him with three years ago._

_So Sakura said, "Go help the others. I'll handle this."_

"_You sure?"_

"_Positive," said Sakura, and her voice showed that she meant it. "And…"_

_Sasuke raised an eyebrow at the hesitation in Sakura's voice. "And?"_

"_Naruto…is he…okay?"_

_Damn. Sasuke had just managed to put his face back into its usual cold expression and suddenly he had to fight to keep from smiling again. "Worried sick about you, but that's nothing new."_

_Sakura nodded and hung her head slightly, doubt creeping back upon her. She had hurt him so badly…_

_Sasuke squeezed her hand gently. He wanted to give supportive words, but didn't know how. Desperation had given him a momentarily loose tongue, but now with his mind clear again he found himself unable to emote._

_Sakura understood anyway, and raised her head again. "Please protect him," she said softly._

"_Protect yourself and I won't need to. You know nothing I can do will get him out of the line of fire until _you're_ out of the line of fire."_

_Sakura nodded. "I know," she said uncertainly. Her gaze grew determined. "I know."_

_Sasuke gave his friend one more nod before breaking the mental connection._

* * *

Sasuke moved smoothly back into his own head without a gasp or a jolt; he was far beyond such childishness. But despite his characteristic outward calm, Sasuke knew how badly drained his chakra and strength were. Ridiculous as it sounded, Sasuke just wanted to lay down in the field and take a nap.

He wasn't the only one; his four teammates were still fighting their demon opponents, and they were obviously exhausted. Armor hung off in tatters from trained bodies, blood dripped from multiple wounds and four pairs of eyes were so horribly bloodshot it would have been impossible to pick Kakashi's _sharingan_ from the bunch.

Still, Kakashi, Naruto, Sai and Chouji's battle against the demons was tilting in their favor. The demon's numbers weren't as endless as they had first seemed, and little by little they were thinning out. The four teammates now fought the battle of mountain climbers who had gone far past their limit, but were sustained by the sight of their goal just meters in front of their faces.

Sasuke was brought back to Sakura when she screamed. Turning around so quickly he almost tripped in his exhausted state, he found her writhing and shaking as though trapped in an epileptic fit.

She was fighting the demon inside of her, struggling with everything she had left to wipe it out. Again Sasuke wanted to yell encouraging words, but restrained himself and drew _kusanagi_. Whatever Naruto said, and however much he wanted Sakura to win, he was prepared to end her life if she lost.

Sakura screamed, and the sound echoed over even the battle surrounding her. It wasn't a sound of pain, but rather one of rage that Sasuke found reassuring. It clearly expressed just how hard Sakura was fighting.

A loud rip sounded in the wake of Sakura's scream, and Sasuke had a second to wonder if Sakura hadn't torn something with her wild movements before he realized she had two heads.

Sasuke was not a man who startled easily, but he did a double take at the strange sight. There was Sakura's head, her face red and sweating with effort, but still the same face he'd always known. And beside it was another head, black and deformed and diseased as though it was decomposing.

The ripping sound grew louder, Sakura's shrieks providing a twisted soundtrack as a second set of shoulders shoved out from her own, and then another chest. Sakura looked like she was half a Siamese twin with her sibling growing out of her side.

Sasuke gripped his sword tighter. This was bad. Either because Sakura was unable to kill the demon or because the demon was running away, it and Sakura were separating. If it still had the amount of power it did when Sasuke fought it hours ago, he might be in trouble.

Naruto was standing behind him. Sasuke did not bother to question the wisdom of this. The demon ranks were thinning, so their other three teammates probably no longer needed his help. And besides, Sasuke knew better than to think that Naruto would be anywhere but at Sakura's side when she was in this much trouble and pain.

"Sakura and I don't have much chakra left," said Sasuke, addressing Naruto though he didn't take his gaze off of Sakura's grotesquely twisted form.

"No problem," replied Naruto grimly, clenching his hand into a fist. Sasuke had no doubt that Naruto was going to take an indecent amount of pleasure killing the demon in front of them—and really, so would he.

Sakura fell to the ground, her screams fading into gasps as the last of the demon's body left her. Without waiting for the demon to straighten up, without even a word, Sasuke and Naruto attacked.

* * *

Sai watched the original Team Seven fight for the first time. He had never seen anything like it.

They moved together synchronously, complementing each others moves and reacting to each others body language like they'd seen the cues a million times before. Sakura punched the demon in its rotting face, which lined it up perfectly for Naruto to trip it from behind into Sasuke's sword.

But ah, the demon slid cleverly around the sword and knocked it out of Sasuke's hand, and so Naruto, who was closest, covered Sasuke by sending a shadow clone to defend him while Sasuke dived for _kusanagi_…

It was poetry in motion! Here were three people who were a part of each other in a way that Sai could barely comprehend, let alone try to emulate. They had not fought together in years, and yet they understood each other enough that this was the result. Whatever Sasuke and Sakura had done, whatever they would do in the future, would never have any bearing on their place on the team.

Sai began to realize that he would never be a part of Team Seven, not really. Whoever went home with each other after the fighting was over, Naruto and Sakura and Sasuke would always be one…and there was no room for anyone else.

Sai suddenly felt very alone. It didn't matter what he did, in the end, didn't matter who he slept with or fought or what books he read. The unity he was witnessing was not for him, and being a part of it could never be more than a dream.

* * *

"Sakura-chan—" Naruto yelled, as the demon raced for her.

"I got it!" Sakura dived out of the way and swung around, planting a kick directly into the demon's lower back. It flew forward with a grunt, unable to stop itself, and landed impaled upon _kusanagi._

Sasuke had moved into position so fast that no one had seen him go; it was as though the sword had been teleported between the demon's third and fourth ribs. The inertia from Sakura's kick sent both combatants sprawling to the ground with a thud that made Naruto wince.

Writhing and gasping, its face a study of incredulity, the demon clawed at Sasuke's face with brown and rotting fingers, kicking its legs feebly at nothing. Sasuke gritted his teeth and tried to shove his enemy off of himself, but he couldn't let go of his sword lest the hilt slam into his own midsection.

Naruto was at the demon's back in a heartbeat, his right hand reaching out to grab its putrid shoulder while forming _rasengan_ in his left.

Its eyes rolling in terror, its mouth foaming and bleeding, the demon took one last look at Sakura. It said nothing, but Sakura understood it plainly enough.

_Sakura-chan!_

_You wouldn't do this to your Auntie, would you? I love you! Only I love you!_

_Don't do this to me!_

Sakura's expression was as cold as _Yuki no Kuni_ in winter, murder and revenge clearly communicated through her eyes. "Die," she said as Naruto pushed his chakra into the demon's body.

It did.

* * *

Sakura sat on the ground and stared at "Auntie" one last time.

Her brain wasn't working properly. Perhaps she was in shock, or maybe her mind was still adjusting to being back in control of her body for the first time in months. Sakura didn't know, and wasn't with herself enough to care.

So, she studied the remains of her violator with a detached eye, and wondered how many people the putrid thing had destroyed in its many centuries. Had it always looked like this? Like a leprosy victim in advanced stages, with strips of flesh peeling off and pus dripping from its pores like sweat? Or was this what Sakura had reduced it to?

She was shivering, hard, and couldn't stop herself. Sakura drew into herself, tucking her limbs as close to her body as she could, and tried to disappear.

An arm draped itself gently across her shoulders, and Sakura became aware that Naruto had pulled her close to him and was rocking her back and forth like a child. His clothes were ruined, filthy and ripped in so many places that they were about to fall off. He had a huge bruise that mottled most of the left side of his face and shut one blue eye almost completely, and blood ran down his chest in alarming amounts.

The concern on his face broke her heart.

There would be consequences for this. Sakura knew she wouldn't be ready to face the world again for weeks, and Naruto wasn't going to be much better off. He had betrayed his own code by "letting" her get hurt, and though she didn't blame him, she knew he'd blame himself. And then there was what she'd done with Sai—once Sakura was well enough that Naruto didn't have to worry about her anymore, he was going to be very, very hurt and possibly just as angry.

Sakura decided to worry about those consequences tomorrow. Today she curled herself into Naruto's warm chest, and let him protect her from the reality that would come.

* * *

It was less then ten minutes later that Chouji took down the last demon with a roar and a swing of his chakra-engorged fist. After the death of the queen demon, the others had swarmed into chaos, and the Konoha ninja were grateful. God only knew how much more they could have born.

Kakashi collapsed from overuse of his _sharingan_ and Sai rolled his eyes before moving to help him. "You're always so dramatic, _taicho._"

Naruto walked over to them to see if he could help, but there wasn't much he could do while he was carrying Sakura bridal style. "Anybody hurt?"

Kakashi gave Naruto a look with his regular eye.

Naruto shrugged. "Hey, I know what's wrong with you. I mean, anybody hurt in a significant way?"

"I don't think so," said Chouji, moving his neck around to check for injuries. "How's Sakura?"

Naruto grimaced and looked down at the girl who had almost plastered herself to his chest. He had no idea how to describe her condition. "She's…alive."

"Where'd the homo go?" Sai was looking around from under Kakashi's shoulder. It took Naruto a moment to realize he was talking about Sasuke.

"Oh, he's right back—" Naruto turned to gesture to the space where Team Seven had fought their first battle together in almost four years, only to find it empty save for the demon's corpse.

"…Sasuke?" Naruto began looking around like Sai, but Sasuke was nowhere to be seen.

"…Well, fuck." Sasuke hadn't just left without even checking how Sakura was, had he? Oh, Naruto would _kill _him...

Sakura began to squirm with discomfort, and Naruto realized he was holding her so tightly she couldn't breathe. He quickly loosened his grip and told himself to be enraged at Sasuke later.

Naruto, Sai and Chouji all stared at each other for several seconds. Anything they thought to say sounded stupid and trite.

"Uh," Chouji finally spoke up. "Can we go home now?"

"I think that's the best idea I've heard, ever," Naruto said. Sakura wasn't all that heavy, but carrying her was going to be a bitch—not that it ever occurred to him to do otherwise.

The team had been walking for less than a minute when Sakura began to tug on Naruto's ruined jacket, desperation in her eyes. She clearly had something very important to say.

Naruto leaned down as much as he could and put his face up to hers. "What's up, Sakura-chan?"

"Naruto," she said, "Am I a bitch?"

Naruto stopped walking. That was, by a wide margin, the least likely thing she could have said. "Wh…huh?"

But the urgency didn't leave Sakura's face. She stared up at him, green eyes wide and mouth trembling, begging him for an answer.

_Oh, jeez._ Naruto's gaze became shifty. How could he respond to that? The honest answer was _yes_, but how the hell could you say that to a girl you adored who was currently suffering from horrible trauma? Even Naruto had more tact than that.

Sakura noticed that Naruto suddenly couldn't look at her, and understood what his answer was.

She smiled. "That's good," she said, and fell asleep.

* * *

A/N

The action is all over (and the story is nearly over)! Everyone who wanted to know about what's gonna happen to Naruto and Sakura's relationship (and to Sai, of course) will get answers in the last couple of chapters. Thanks for being patient!


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: If I owned it, I wouldn't be writing fan fiction!

Warnings: Language and discussion about sex.

Finding Sakura

Chapter Ten

By Michiru's Mirror

* * *

Sakura had spent three years training as a medic, and during those years she spent at least one day a week at the hospital. She had never minded; in fact, she came to love the process of healing others, and always enjoyed learning new things.

But being a patient was different. It was bad enough when you were sick, but being forced to lie in a bed for days when you were _healthy_ was intolerable. Sakura lay, and she counted the number of tiles in the ceiling, and she watched the same re-run of her mother's favorite soap opera for the fourth time, and she counted the cracks in the tiles in the ceiling, and she read some old manga, and she counted the spots of dust buried in the cracks in the tiles in the ceiling when she got _really_ bored.

Tsunade wouldn't even let her study! They couldn't trust that she was really herself yet, she said, they had to make sure that Sakura was alone in her own head again by running every test in creation on her before they could give her any "sensitive information". Sakura couldn't leave the room, couldn't contact anyone but trained medics and _jounin_ guards. Sakura was so bored and so lonely that she wanted to shriek. In her sleep, she did.

Part of her was grateful for being so completely ensconced in a hospital room/cell, though. After what she had done, Sakura's first instinct was to hide. She had betrayed Naruto's trust in her, hurt Ino, and almost killed Sasuke. And then there was Sai. God, the things she had done with him!

The enemy had come for her, and it was her own shame—like always. It pushed her down and choked her and ate her up one little bit at a time. She was so sick and tired of it she could have cried.

And there was nothing to distract her from her enemy as she lay alone in that white, white room with its cracked ceiling and its broken TV.

Nightmares were inevitable when she went to sleep, of course, though Sakura rarely remembered what she was dreaming about once she woke up. She was almost bored with how routine it felt when she woke up screaming.

But there were moments of comfort that kept Sakura sane. Moments when Tsunade or Shizune would come to her so they could eat lunch together while chatting and giggling about nothing at all, or times that someone would bring her news from the outside.

Sometimes at night when she woke up from a bad dream, Sakura would swear that a dark shape was hovering outside the bars of her window, its red eyes focused on her and watching over her while she rested. Those eyes lulled her back to sleep, and Sakura would never be sure if it was the _sharingan_ working its magic or just her imagination.

It was just over a week later that Tsunade finally gave her leave to have visitors, and Sakura was seen by a number of people in rapid succession: Lee came bounding in first with a bouquet so big that Sakura couldn't see his head, followed by Ino who came in to squeal about all the nightclubbing Sakura had been missing. This was followed by her parents who were still have trouble figuring out just what was going on, Kakashi who let Sakura know in no uncertain terms that she wasn't getting out of training just because she'd been out of commission for awhile, and Team Eight who collectively came over to give her good wishes and drop off some more manga they thought she might enjoy.

The stream of visitors continued all day as more and more people became aware that Sakura's door had finally been opened.

Naruto did not visit. Nor did Sai.

Sakura was so devastated that for the first time since being admitted to the hospital she didn't want to get out of bed. Their absences were clear messages from both men about the state of their relationships with her, and Sakura couldn't bear the thought that she had lost them forever.

She would deserve it if she had. She had betrayed both Sai and Naruto, resulting in emotional wounds so deep she couldn't even begin to understand them.

Well…she could understand the wounds. But that didn't make it all right that she had caused them.

Humiliation and fear made Sakura want to avoid both boys, but she knew from painful experience just where following that feeling got her. Humiliation at not being good enough made her cower when she was twelve, resulting in her teammates and poor Lee being hurt by the Sound Ninja. Humiliation at having failed to convince Sasuke to stay in Konoha made her stay behind when Naruto went out to get Sasuke back, resulting in the near-death of his teammates.

Well, not this time.

Sakura's decision to not run away from her feelings this time was not one of courage (or so she believed), but instead one of logic and love. Every time she hid from her shame everyone she cared about wound up getting hurt. Not even Ino or Naruto could scare away the horrors in Sakura's heart or heal the wounds she had given her teammates. No, if Sakura wanted the best for her loved ones—and there was nothing she wanted more in the whole world—then she would have to stop cowering.

It was a difficult decision, but now there was no Auntie whispering incessantly into her ear that she was pathetic and no good. She was left with only her own self-doubts, and while they were difficult and embarrassing, they were manageable. She had begun to learn to deal with them in the Forest of Death when she fought sound ninja to save her teammates, and grew more talented at it from there. She had confronted her fears about her physical weakness and emerged a talented and capable medic ninja, hadn't she?

So even if this was the worst crisis of conscience she had ever faced, she could do this. She could face her doubts and weaknesses again.

Still, when Sakura finally forced herself to step out of the hospital she could find no hope in her heart. The sun beat against her face painfully, mocking her with its brightness, and the noises outside made her want to cover her ears and whimper.

Sakura balled her hands into fists, making the scar on her left arm stand out in sharp relief. Taking a deep breath, she stared at the scar Auntie had made to remind herself of all that had happened, and all she had yet to do.

Shaking but steady, Sakura walked down the wooden stairs that led down the side of the hospital building to the world outside.

* * *

Naruto was sitting alone in his room when Sakura came to him. He'd been doing that a lot lately.

Wasn't that strange? Wasn't that just a kick in the teeth that as long as he was fighting for his beloved friends who had kicked him in the balls with their betrayals he was just as energetic as could be, but when there was no fight to be had…

It was as if all of his energy was gone. There was no danger to his body, no danger to Sakura's body, and so the only thing in danger now was their relationship. Naruto had been so sure that he could forgive any wrong from his friends, positive that there was nothing they could do that would make him love them any less. On the battlefield, he had proven over and over again that that was true. Off the battlefield, it seemed he lost all his courage and all his compassion, to the point where he was fucking _hiding_ from Sakura in his apartment.

The idea of seeing her made him almost physically ill. Just looking at a picture of her face made him feel so angry that he could punch a wall…and so guilty for his anger that the strength left his body in a rush. It wasn't her fault, damn it! She'd been possessed by a demon, being killed inside bit by bit and he hadn't even noticed. Think of all the things he'd done when under the _kyuubi's_ influence. What right did he have to be mad?

But he was, and the more he tried to forget how angry he was, the clearer he saw Sakura, naked and bleeding before him: _I asked Sai to do this!_

Naruto had never been so confused in his life. Rage, hurt, betrayal, guilt, self-hatred; all these mixed inside him like a horrible concoction of poisons combining to ruin his concentration and destroy his confidence. There was no strength in him now.

So, he lay in his room like a petulant child and tried to pretend the world didn't exist (and, needless to say, failed miserably).

When his doorbell rang and he saw that it was Sakura, Naruto had to fight the immediate urge to escape though the back window. He reached for his doorknob, irritated and angry to see that his hand was trembling. Trembling! Him! He was Uzumaki Naruto, god damn it! He was the next _Hokage_, the greatest ninja there ever was, the man who could beat anyone! Little girls didn't scare him!

And so, when he opened the door, he did it with such an arrogant flourish that Sakura was reminded of Sasuke for a moment. She took in his hostile posture, his determined face and his narrowed eyes with shock, and found herself frozen to his doorstep for a moment.

"Um." She said when she recovered herself. He hadn't said a word. "Can I come in?"

He stared at her for several seconds, his gaze becoming no less aggressive. Then, he turned away from her and retreated back into his apartment—but he left the door open.

Sakura scurried quietly inside and shut the door while toeing her shoes off. Naruto found that he didn't want to look at her, and so he kept her to his back and acted as though he was intently studying the blank stretch of wall that led to his bathroom. But when there was no further noise behind him, not so much as a rustle of cloth or an intake of breath, he turned.

Sakura was almost prostrate on his floor, her head down.

Naruto gaped. "S-Sakura-chan! What—!"

"I'm sorry!" Sakura cried out the words as though she couldn't say them normally, but had to force them through her throat.

To say that Naruto was taken aback was an understatement. "Why?" He heard himself saying, as if from a great distance. "You didn't do…it wasn't your fault…it's not…"

"Oh, Naruto," said Sakura, and though she didn't raise her head, the old familiar exasperation crept into her voice. "Don't, Naruto. Just don't."

"Don't what?"

"I don't want your excuses. I can't deny what I've done to you—I don't want to deny it! I was hurting, and so I made the worst decision I could possibly make and hurt you. Any excuse I can make for that, any denial I can cook up, is _wrong_.

"Please, don't pretend you're not hurt by what I did. Don't try to protect my feelings like you always do by discarding your own. I've wronged you so badly I don't know if I can ever make it up, but I know I can't even begin to try if you won't let me apologize."

Naruto found himself growing warm almost in spite of himself. That Sakura would care about his feelings this much, that she would go this far for him when she was hurting herself and could easily get away with denying what she'd done, touched him deeply. It made it easier to remember other things she had done, like hiding the way he had hurt her when he became the _kyuubi_ to spare his feelings, or supporting him in the _chuunin_ exam's tournament.

"Sakura-chan, it's not like you were cheating," he said with a sigh, plopping down on the floor in front of her.

Sakura hesitated, her back growing stiff, before she finally straightened up. "Not…not technically. But wasn't I, really?" She bit her lip and looked at Naruto from under her bangs, looking terribly uncertain.

Naruto knew what she meant. He thought of how he'd asked her on a date after their first training session with Kakashi as equals, and how she'd said yes as long as he paid. He thought of how she'd tried to feed him his ramen when he hurt his hand before Sai interfered. He thought of how she let his head rest on her lap when he was injured, and how she blushed to see him shirtless or acting cool. They hadn't made any announcements, hadn't officially declared that they were dating, but when Naruto thought about it Sakura had been sending as many signals of attraction his way as he had sent towards her. Maybe he did have a reason to be mad after all.

He was surprised by how much better that made him feel.

"Yeah, okay," he said, staring at the floor between his splayed legs. "Meanwhile, if we're being honest, don't try to tell me you're not pissed at me too."

Sakura hesitated, torn between her promise to be truthful and her desire to spare Naruto's feelings.

"Yeah, right!" Naruto said in response to the look on her face. "You were drowning and I didn't even notice. Then when it was brought to my attention I called what you were doing 'disgusting.'"

"And came to my rescue," Sakura was quick to point out.

"Sure, when it came to pounding Sai's face in. When it looked like you needed a different kind of help I went running out the fucking window." Naruto sighed. "So don't act like you're not mad."

"…Maybe a little." Sakura's voice was very quiet.

For a moment the two sat in silence, and it was the best moment they'd had together since Sakura had been possessed. It was contemplative and thoughtful instead of awkward.

"I'm still mad," said Naruto, so abruptly that Sakura jumped. "I don't want to be. I want to pretend this whole fucked-up mess never happened but every time I shut my eyes I-I see Sai…and you…"

"I know," said Sakura quietly. "And…I'm prepared to take responsibility for what I've done."

Naruto felt himself go cold. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"It means…" Sakura took a deep breath, and there was real fear on her face. "It means I've done wrong by you and want to do whatever I can to make up for it." She was twisting her hands now, the delicate flesh turning pink at the abuse. "So if you can't forgive me…if you can't look at me without hurting…I'll…I'll go away." The words were obviously terribly difficult for her to say. She had to force them out, shoving them with her tongue past stumbling lips and teeth.

And again, most of Naruto felt warmed and touched by just how far she would go for him. But he didn't hold her, didn't comfort her, didn't tell her that he loved her and never wanted her to leave because there was a tiny, shameful part of his mind that was sneering at her pain. _See how you like it! See how you like being afraid of losing everything, of being left by someone you love!_

He was ashamed of himself, but the angry, sadistic thoughts couldn't be denied now any more than they could be earlier. So he said nothing, just continued staring at the floor.

Moments passed, and then he heard Sakura choke on her own fear and pain at his rejection. Nodding, trying to be mature and show Naruto that she meant what she'd said, that she could do this for him, Sakura pushed herself up and stumbled to her feet. She looked anywhere but him. She couldn't look at him, not if she wanted to hold her tears in.

"All right," she said, her voice tense with restrained emotion. "All right." She turned to leave. Naruto thought she would run right out, but she stopped in the doorway, holding on to the edge of the door to support herself.

"I think I wanted you to see me," Sakura said. "I think I had Sai do those things to me in front of the window because I wanted you to see me. It was the same urge that had me hurting myself, the urge to punish myself as much as possible. I knew that if you saw me, this would happen."

She turned to look at him then, and Naruto was shocked by the pain in her eyes. He had never seen her look so lost, not even when she was sobbing at him to bring Sasuke home.

She ran out the door, and by the time Naruto could move again, she had disappeared.

* * *

Sakura knew Naruto wasn't the last person she had to talk to.

When Sasuke had reminded Sakura of her sins, he rightly pointed out that she had hurt Ino. It had been Sakura that chose to break off her friendship with Ino, she who had initiated their rivalry when Ino had done nothing but support and love her.

But Ino understood. She saw who Sakura was now, and knew that the Sakura she had known had grown tired of always needing support and help and had wanted to stand on her own two feet and be judged by her own merits. Sakura could never have done that with Ino always in her shadow, waiting to catch her when she fell. She _had_ to distance herself from her friend if she wanted to grow.

Sakura knew she'd made a royal mess of the separation, making a competition out of a silly crush and being so mean when breaking things off. However, Sakura had been a child, without the maturity to be graceful or the experience to find a better way to make herself bloom than fighting against her role model. Ino knew that. Above all others Ino understood Sakura's pride and her determination to become more than she had been. Ino forgave her for it…and was proud of her for succeeding. Sakura owed an apology, but she would never give it, because Ino neither expected nor wanted one.

Kakashi was the same. He held high standards for his students, and if Tsunade had been a better teacher to Sakura than he, he wasn't going to blame Sakura from choosing Tsunade over him. He would have been mad if she _hadn't _done what was best for herself and Konoha.

No, the person she owed an apology to was the one Sasuke had forgotten to mention.

Sakura found Sai on the training grounds practicing his throwing arm with _kunai_ and a large target posted against a huge oak tree. She was relieved that she did not have to go to his apartment to find him, because after all the things they had done there it might have given him the wrong idea.

Rather than disturb him, Sakura sat down on the edge of the field and watched Sai practice his throws. This gave her time to pull herself together, and she was glad.

Sai wasn't bad, but he was definitely rusty. Sakura could relate—it was easy to get too dependant on one skill and forsake others. Sai's art _jutsu_ were just so useful, he probably rarely had to use anything else.

He had to know she was there. Sakura waited patiently, watching him throw _kunai_ and letting him adjust to her presence at his own pace. Given that his aim was substantially worse than it had been when she first sat down, she guessed he had to be thinking pretty hard about what to do now. That, or he was very uncomfortable.

Sakura had to grin at how strange this was. It wasn't usually a girl who owed a guy an apology for taking advantage of his inexperience in sexual matters.

Sai finally decided to stop pretending Sakura wasn't there. He went to pull his _kunai_ out of the target and said, "You look like shit. What, haven't you bathed?"

From anyone else, that would have been a very clear "go away," but Sai wasn't anyone else. If he had been, their nighttime meetings wouldn't have been possible.

"Yeah. I look like shit because I'm still an emotional wreck. I was just crying." No point in beating around the bush.

"Ah." Sai walked over to her and sat down beside her, settling into the grass and meticulously sliding his _kunai_ into their holsters. "I've always wondered why you cry so much. It seems like such a waste of time."

"Hmm…" Sakura tilted her head and leaned back, enjoying the feel of grass between her fingers. "That's a difficult question to answer. I suppose I cry because feelings sometimes build up inside of me, and I feel like I'd just explode if I didn't let them out."

Sai looked at her strangely. "You must be a very emotional person if you feel like you're going to explode so often."

Sakura laughed. Really, even if he shot her apology down, it had been worth coming here just to hear that. "I guess I am!"

The two teammates sat in silence for a moment and watched the horizon. The sun was beginning to set, and the sky looked like a painting in pinks and purples and blues. Sakura's mind drifted back to a million days like today, days sitting with Naruto and Sasuke and Kakashi and just watching the sky change color and not saying a word…

"You're not going to cry now, are you?" Sai asked. Sakura realized her eyes were indeed becoming moist. "It's so irritating, watching you cry. I never know what I'm supposed to do."

"Sorry, but I might," said Sakura. "I owe you an apology."

Sai looked so confused that Sakura had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing. "For crying?"

"No, for using you for sex." Sakura hadn't intended to be that blunt, but around Sai she sometimes couldn't help it.

"Oh," said Sai, looking no less confused. "Um. Why are you apologizing for that? The sex was good, if that's what you're worried about."

Sakura made a valiant effort at keeping her face from turning tomato red. "Thank you. But no, that's not what I was worried about. It's just that it's not nice to use people."

"Then why did you do it?" Sai asked. He leaned back as though making himself comfortable for a long story.

Sakura sighed. She had expected questions from him, and the least she owed him was some honest answers. "Because I was in so much pain I stopped caring who I hurt."

"Really? Then why me? Why not Naruto? He's wanted to have sex with you for years."

_Suppress the blush, suppress the blush_. "He'd have said yes if I wanted sex, but he would never have agreed to hurt me, Sai. He knows enough about sex and the human brain to know that wanting to hurt yourself, and connecting pain with sex, are…unusual.

"Besides, Naruto wants more than just sex from me, and I couldn't give more." Sakura shrugged, a slight blush dusting her cheeks.

"Okay, so why not just pick up some loser in a bar?"

Sakura shook her head. "That wouldn't have been any good. I wanted to hurt myself, and hurt the people around me, and some drunk whose name I'd never learn wouldn't have had the right…emotional impact. It had to be someone I trusted and liked, but without any romantic attachment. So I used you. And I'm sorry."

"Oh," said Sai. Then: "You trust me?"

Sakura looked surprised that he would ask. "Of course. Did you think I didn't?"

"I guess," said Sai thoughtfully. "I saw how you and Sasuke and Naruto were together on the battlefield, and it was unlike anything I'd ever seen before." He shrugged. "Like moving together was imprinted on your DNA, totally basic and natural. I don't have that with anyone, not even you or dickless or Yamato-_taichou_."

No sign of hurt showed on Sai's porcelain face, but Sakura understood just the same. "I know the feeling. I remember how hard it was, being on a team with two guys who were so obviously so close to each other. I was just the odd little loser who couldn't understand them and just wasn't as important." Sakura sighed. "It's shitty.

"But Sai, even if we're your first friends, we won't be your last. You'll meet other people, and make relationships with them, and if you're looking for something like Naruto and Sasuke's partnership, you will find it." Sakura turned to Sai, who was staring at the sunset but studying her through the corner of his eye. "And meanwhile, we _are_ your friends, and Naruto and Kakashi-sensei and I are happy to have you with us." She smiled.

Sai thought about that for a moment. He was welcome, he knew that. And he supposed that just as Sasuke and Naruto and Sakura hadn't found each other right away, he couldn't expect to find his own place so quickly either. "I wonder if Sasuke ever felt left out, then," he said.

Sakura looked surprised. Why on earth would Sasuke have felt left out? It was he and Naruto who had shared the connection that had always made her so jealous!

"Sasuke-kun? Why would he?"

Sai said, "Because the way Naruto looks at you is unlike how he looks at anyone else." He looked past Sakura's shoulder and said, "Like he's looking at you now."

Sakura froze.

She spun around to look where Sai was looking. Sure enough, Naruto was there.

* * *

A/N

Next chapter is the last.

A great big thank you to my fantastic beta Ceras Gala, who really saved my bacon in this chapter by pointing out a lot of weaknesses I hadn't noticed.

Please review and let me know what you all think. I like how this chapter came out overall, but I'm still nervous about how well the dialouge and emotions came across. If I suck, tell me, I always want to get better. If I did well, tell me, because a writer always loves to hear that she did well!


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: Naruto isn't mine. Excuse me while I go cry.

Warnings: Language.

Finding Sakura

Final Chapter

By Michiru's Mirror

* * *

In the Akimichi compound there are many small sheds that are used to house extra food. Sometimes when they become old, they are abandoned and allowed to dilapidate and fall to ruin. When leaving the shed up becomes unbearable due to rotted beams, an infestation of insects and a terrible smell, the shed is demolished. 

Akimichi Chouji loved his family with all his heart but like any teenager, he needed his space. At the age of thirteen he first found one of the recently abandoned sheds and hid himself inside of it. He had been training that day, determined to prove his worthiness to Shikamaru, and instead wound up trodding on Asuma-sensei's foot with his own enlarged one.

Chouji knew that Asuma-sensei didn't really mean all the insulting things he'd said, that the pain in his foot inspired him to uncharacteristic meanness, but that did not make the sensitive boy hurt any less.

The shed was dark and cool and peaceful, and no one had to see Chouji crying in such a shameful unmanly way. Since that day Chouji went to the shed when Shikamaru couldn't help him with his problems or when he just had to be alone to think something through.

It was inevitable that the rest of Team Ten would find out about it. A mission was issued, Chouji had to be found, and the shed was uncovered.

Chouji requested that his friends not reveal his secret hideout to anyone. To his surprise they not only agreed, but made sure to steer clear of the place themselves in a touching display of respect for his privacy.

As long as they weren't abusing the privilege, Chouji found he didn't mind if they joined him in his shed when he felt like company. Shikamaru and Ino would come if he asked and stay until he showed signs of wanting to be alone again. It was simple.

Right now he didn't want to be alone, and fortunately he wasn't the only one. Shikamaru was sitting across from Chouji on the shed's floor, shuffling cards in an increasingly irritated manner as moments ticked by.

"Where IS that damn woman?"

As if in response, the boys heard familiar footsteps quickly approaching the shed. Chouji had been surprised to realize how individual a person's footsteps really were, just like their fingerprints or their eyes or their personalities. These steps were light but steady, the walk of someone who was straightforward, confident, and feminine.

"Sorry!" said Ino as she burst inside, panting slightly. "I guess this makes me fashionably late, ha ha!"

"No, it makes you irritating," said Shikamaru blithely as Chouji put a hand over his mouth to keep from snickering. He was in enough trouble with Ino as it was. Two nights ago he'd fallen straight to sleep after sex after he'd promised he wouldn't. If he started laughing at her, she'd probably never sleep with him again. "Sit down already or I'm going to deal you out."

Ino rolled her eyes and sat. "Well okay, but you should know you're dealing for four."

Chouji froze. "You…you didn't."

Sai walking in the door answered his question. Ino had indeed invited an outsider into Chouji's solitude.

Shikamaru glared at Ino over the deck of cards while Chouji gaped at her with betrayed shock all over his round features. Ino just smirked. Maybe this would teach Chouji not to fall asleep.

Shikamaru shook his head and began to deal Sai in. Subtle hints that he wasn't welcome wouldn't work on that boy, and he knew Chouji was much too polite to throw him out directly. Shikamaru was left to wonder at the depths Ino would sink to to get revenge, though he knew her too well to be surprised. If Chouji hadn't been expecting something like this he was either naïve or delusional.

Sai was looking around the room as he picked up his cards. "This place is really ugly," he commented. "It wouldn't kill you to put a few pictures on the wall, would it?"

Chouji looked like he did when somebody called him fat, so Shikamaru decided to save the situation before everyone in the shed wound up dead. "Ah. So Sai, what brings you here, then?"

"_Bijin-san_ ran into me on the street," said Sai, now studying his cards. "She invited me and here I am."

"And you didn't have anywhere else to be?" said Chouji. Shikamaru grimaced. So much for polite. He'd never dreamed that anything could bother Chouji as much as his weight, but it seemed this place was just as touchy a subject.

Sai was either oblivious to Chouji's hostility or pretended not to notice it. "Nope," he said. "I was training, but Dickless threw me off the field."

"Oh really?" said Ino, not really caring but hoping to change the subject. "How come?"

Sai smiled slightly, but didn't look up from his cards. "I think he had a few things to make right."

* * *

This was all wrong. 

Watching Sakura suffer in his apartment had given Naruto a nasty kind of satisfaction in some small, hidden part of his mind, but those cruel feelings had left him in a rush the second she had. The change of emotion was so abrupt that he'd sagged low to the ground, real horror welling up to replace the empty space the sadistic glee had left behind. She had walked out and wasn't coming back, because she thought it was what he wanted. He'd hurt her and himself even worse then they'd already been hurting. When had even the dumbest, rottenest part of his mind thought that was a good idea?

Naruto knew he had to fix things somehow, and going after her had felt natural. Didn't Sakura know that nothing was any good if she wasn't with him? What the hell was the point of becoming _Hokage_ if everyone precious to you was lost and it was your fault that they were gone?

Naruto had run through the streets of Konoha fighting an almost physical pain in his chest made from panic and pain and fear. He looked for Sakura down narrow filthy little alleyways and up wide crowded market streets, across rooftops and through restaurants. In the back of a little tea shop with the most mouthwatering array of sweets Naruto had ever seen (he'd have to take Sakura here later), he found Iruka-sensei proofreading reports.

Naruto shouted a hello as he passed but didn't bother to linger. He knew for a fact that Iruka-sensei had about as much experience with women as your average twelve-year-old, and besides, he'd probably yell at Naruto if he knew how stupid his former student had been acting. Naruto didn't doubt that he deserved the scolding, but right now he was in no mood for it. He'd probably get a good thumping from Sakura, and that should be punishment enough.

He'd found her on the training grounds with Sai, and the companiable way they were sitting together and chatting caused a flash of jealousy to add to the weight in his chest.

But then he heard her talking about feeling left out. The way she was comforting Sai was amazing given how hurt she obviously was. Naruto found himself smiling at her in a way he hadn't been able to for days, and it was then that Sai drew Sakura's attention to him.

He saw the hurt and guilt on her face and wanted to stab himself, but that would hardly do Sakura any good. So instead he said, "Sai, get lost."

Sai smiled in that way he had that let you know you were screwed. "Might as well. If it were a man that wanted to be alone with her, I might worry that he had less than pure intentions. But for a eunuch like you there's really no danger."

Naruto boggled. "_You're_ trying to tell me about pure intentions?" He was so astonished by this he didn't even notice the eunuch jab.

Sai paused before realizing what Naruto meant. "Oh, right."

Naruto opened his mouth to say something so brilliantly scathing that it would send Sai running away with tears in his eyes, but Sakura spoke before he could.

"Sai," she said, her voice so small that Naruto could barely hear her. "Please."

Sai turned to Sakura and studied her as best he could when faced with her back. His dark eyes trained themselves on the back of Sakura's head and he went still, looking more like a marble statue instead of a man. His expression was terribly serious, as though something very important that he hadn't understood before now was becoming clear to him.

Finally he nodded and stood up. He walked over to Naruto on his way off the training field but only said, "Later, Dickless," before passing him by and disappearing into the rapidly darkening night.

Naruto watched him go, not because he was interested, but because it was better to watch Sai's retreating figure than Sakura's cowering one. The goddamn pain in his chest _still_ wasn't going away.

But however cowed Sakura was, however subdued and humiliated, she was still the same impatient Sakura that he knew. Before Naruto could gather enough courage to turn to her, she had come up behind him.

"Naruto?" She said, her voice hesitant.

It struck Naruto how wrong the training field was for this discussion. The field was a violent place for fighting and killing, and it somehow polluted and ruined the words he wanted to say. It was only days ago that he fought a possessed Sakura right here on this green.

"Okay," he said, "Earlier—y'know, in my apartment?"

Sakura looked at him as though he was the biggest idiot on earth. "I'm not likely to forget, Naruto."

Naruto, not in the mood to joke, gave Sakura an irritated look only to feel embarrassed and guilty when she shrank away. He was overwhelmed by helplessness and anger—to think that mighty Sakura had been reduced to this, and that his most important connection had been so nearly broken!

Well, was he Uzumaki Naruto or not? Did he walk around feeling helpless and letting his precious people give in to _their_ feelings of helplessness? Hell no!

That tiny, wormy part of his brain that made him watch Sakura leave his room crying hours ago poked its head out of the depths of Naruto's subconscious and began to whisper in his ear.

_She deserves this…_

Naruto had a brief, clear mental image of himself drop-kicking that part of his consciousness far, far out into the distance. Anything, even a part of himself, that hurt his Sakura-chan deserved no less. Besides, what about the consequences to him? He never wanted to feel as angry at himself again as he had when he watched Sakura run out of his apartment. If this part of him was making him hurt himself, it was just a big fat traitor, that was all, and a nice hard kick was just what a traitor deserved. So there!

Naruto realized he was nodded emphatically only after he caught sight of Sakura's face; she looked like she was beginning to worry for his sanity.

Naruto cleared his throat and scratched the back of his head, blushing. "Right. Right. Anyway.

"So, back in my apartment. That went all wrong and badly. So you have to come back to my apartment now so we can do it again." Naruto had not planned this, but as soon as he said it he decided it was a fabulous idea.

Sakura didn't seem quite as convinced. "…What?"

But Naruto was already running back to his apartment, not doubting that Sakura would follow, because this was _him_ and _Sakura-chan_ and so it would be all right in the end.

They reached his apartment in moments, and then Naruto opened the door and blocked it before Sakura could come in. "Start again!" he insisted. "Now, you knock, just like last time." He nodded firmly and shut the door.

Sakura was left standing on the doorway for a moment, wondering at what Naruto used for his brain.

Well, she had promised she'd do whatever she had to make him feel better, and she'd meant it. She supposed letting him act like a lunatic was better than being thrown out of his life.

Sakura took a deep breath and knocked on the door. She knew Naruto was waiting on the other side but was still a little taken aback with the flourish he used to open it.

"Sakura-chan!" he boomed so loudly that she winced. "How wonderful to see you!" Naruto frowned for a second, clearly trying to remember if those were the words he had planned on saying. Apparently they were good enough, because he nodded his head and then stepped aside to let her in.

"Naruto, this is getting silly—"

"Shh!" Naruto flapped his arms wildly at her. He had a deeply indignant look on his face because she wasn't going along with the script. "This is where you apologize!"

Sakura prayed for patience. She had almost completely forgotten her sorrow in the face of this annoyingly, _wonderfully_ familiar Naruto who was now hissing instructions and waving his arms like a child begging for attention, and in her own familiar affectionate exasperation. It felt so good and natural that she wanted to cry, and if she had to go along with a little bit of silly role-playing to get it back then what the hell was the problem with that?

So she nodded, and again sank to her knees as Naruto turned his back. She did not bother to point out that Naruto had no reason to turn his back to her if he was no longer uncomfortable facing her; this was his fantasy after all, unconventional as it was.

"Naruto," she said, "I'm sorry. She meant it, and did her best to wish her good intentions into the very air, willing them to reach him—

"Okay."

Sakura blinked.

She couldn't have heard that right. It couldn't be that simple. Not after the days of agony and humiliation and the things he'd said to her not two hours ago in this very apartment. "What?"

"I said, 'okay,'" said Naruto. Sakura looked up, and he was grinning down at her with confidence in his eyes. He was finally sure he was doing the right thing.

"B-but…" Sakura didn't know why she was fighting this, only it was too good to be true and she was so scared that he'd take it back. "But I slept with Sai…"

"And I called that 'disgusting' and ran out on you."

"I hurt you…"

"I hurt you as _kyuubi_."

"I was dangerous to myself and others and didn't even tell you…"

"Yeah and I didn't notice—Sakura-chan, this is pointless!" Naruto was kneeling down with her then, grabbing her shoulders and looking into her eyes so intently that Sakura couldn't doubt her words. "You shoved me when we were kids and I didn't realize when you were all fucked up with doubt before the first _chuunin_ exam. You knocked me aside for Sasuke and I didn't bring him back when I promised. We can go in circles like this all day but I don't think you owe me anything, and I don't want you out of my life."

Sakura was crying, but neither she nor Naruto was surprised by this. "But…but…"

"Sakura, shut up." Naruto smiled, and mentally gave the cruel part of him that had hurt Sakura earlier the finger. That part of him was sulking in a corner, thoroughly defeated and barely a presence, because seeing Sakura happy was so much better then seeing her sad. "Look, I had to go for less than a week thinking you maybe weren't going to be in my life anymore, and I could barely function. I dunno what losing you permanently would do to me and I'd rather not find out, okay? Can we just skip the blame and the years of therapy and at least be friends now?"

Sakura wanted so badly to believe, but she had to check. There was still an inner-cynic whispering that all this couldn't be real. "You don't hate me?"

"No," said Naruto firmly. He frowned thoughtfully. "I'm not sure, but I don't think I'm capable of hating you."

"You don't think I'm a slut?"

"Not unless I'm a murderer for the things _kyuubi's_ done."

Sakura bit her lip. "Are you mad at me?"

Naruto looked surprised again. "What, you're not pissed at me? Sure I'm mad. Mad will pass."

Sakura bit her lip harder and twisted her hands into her red shirt. "…Does that mean I can hug you now?"

They embraced on the floor of Naruto's tiny, dirty apartment at twilight, without any dramatic breezes or romantic moonlight to make the moment beautiful. That was all right. To them, it was beautiful without any help.

* * *

It wasn't simple. 

For the first week after they made up, Sakura wondered if her heart would ever stop hurting when she looked at Naruto, and Naruto wasn't sure if he'd ever be able to see Sakura's face as it was instead of twisted and bloody as it had been the night he'd seen her in Sai's apartment. They would look at each other and then look away. It took more courage than they had to face each other for long.

Still, they always went back to each other the next day. If this was what it took to fix things, then the suffering of hard work was infinitely preferable to the suffering of losing each other completely. But still, there were days when trying yet _again_ seemed unbearably exhausting.

Then one day Team Seven went out for ramen at Ichiraku, and Naruto realized that wasn't thinking about the horrible ordeal they'd been through. He'd been staring at Sakura for twenty minutes without seeing her bloody and violated in Sai's apartment. Three days later Team Seven was out training; Naruto was laughing at a joke Sakura told when it dawned on him that he'd again had no nightmare images in his head for hours.

Another day, Sakura went to a romantic movie with Ino. After sighing at the lead actor's visage, swooning at the climax and going out for a soda with her crying best friend, she found that Auntie hadn't once entered her mind that day.

So the days grew easier to bear, and Naruto and Sakura slowly grew to enjoy each others company again. It took much more time than either wanted to give, but they gave anyway because it was better than losing the most precious relationship in their lives.

They got better. Neither Sakura nor Naruto's inner demons were enough to tear them apart, and time and effort were enough to bring them together.

* * *

A year later Sakura lay in bed letting her thoughts drift wherever they wanted. Naruto's arm felt heavy around her waist, and his snoring was loud in her ears, but tonight Sakura was too tired to even notice. It was winter, and she was warm and comfortable in her soft bed nestled against a body she trusted. Sakura felt as though she was floating high above Konoha, a free spirit content to watch the world pass her by. 

She saw Sasuke, alone and cold in some faraway place exposed to the elements, desperately trying to focus his hatred enough to push past pain and loneliness. Moments like these, when his body was miserable and there was no training or fighting to distract him from his memories and thoughts of what he'd done, were harder than others. Sasuke would think of Naruto and Sakura and Kakashi and his parents, and hate himself for the sickening feeling of warmth that would come to him. He sat shoved up against a rock, the best cover he could find, and shivered until he thought he might break apart.

She saw Kakashi sitting by Obito's grave chatting as though his friend was sitting across from him in a bar. He'd trained that day with Naruto and tried to show the boy a new _jutsu_. Naruto had worked hard as usual and put all of his effort and chakra into the training, but a distraction in the form of a traveling ramen truck had forced an end to the session. Naruto, with an alarming amount of chakra built up in his palm, spun around without realizing Yamato had snuck up into striking distance.

_Tenzo flew a good three meters_, Kakashi said. _It was very impressive_. He smiled, content to be with one friend discussing another on a quiet night when the village was secure. This was all he'd ever really wanted out of life.

Sai was nearby, sketching the Hokage monument, his pencil steady even in the dark. His expression was blank as ever, and Sakura had no inkling of the thoughts that ran behind that porcelain face. Confusion perhaps, or happiness or excitement…or maybe there was nothing at all. He still knew himself so little that she couldn't even begin to understand him.

Tsunade was still hard at work in her office, sake jugs scattered around her desk and a pen in her hand. There was such an almighty scowl on her face that when her poor assistant tried to check on her he was almost rooted to the floor by the force of the gaze locked onto him.

_Well_? Tsunade barked, throwing the pen with what would have been deadly accuracy had she not been drunk off her gourd. _Do you see any full sake jugs on my desk? I sure don't!_

The assistant ran out the door so quickly that he knocked it right off his hinges, the sound of his swearing Hokage following him down three flights of steps and out the door.

Sakura realized she was giggling in a way that was bound to wake Naruto up if she didn't cut it out. She leaned her head sideways and muffled the noise into Naruto's shoulder, the gentle huffing of her breath and clacking of her teeth against his flesh enough to make him squirm slightly. Sakura did it again, because it was funny to watch his brow furrow and his shoulders rub against the pillow like a puppy trying to satisfy an itch.

But she was too tired to maintain the energy she needed for the game, and now was not the time for mischief. Not when she would need her energy for the upcoming days dealing with Sai and his confusion and Sasuke and his almost-ruined soul.

There was so much to do…but Sakura decided to worry about it tomorrow. Tonight Tsunade was hard at work protecting the village so that they could relax and sleep, and even Kakashi-sensei was letting himself unwind. Sakura would follow his example.

She turned even closer into Naruto's body and burrowed her way into his chest with a yawn. There was no better place to be than here, and nothing better to concentrate on than Naruto's twitching and his warm arm and comfortable body. Everything else would just have to wait.

Sakura fell asleep.

* * *

Big huge massive thanks to everyone who stuck with me, and those of you who came onboard for the ride later on. I remain very open to criticism and ideas. 

This story is complete with no future chapters to be written, but I might edit some of it since I'm not satisfied with everything.

I very much owe this fic to Ceras Gala, who beta'd me brilliantly and gave me great ideas all the way through. Thank you, thank you, thank you, you're awesome.


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